The Chinese TON community announced the launch of the TON Community blockchain test network, created on the basis of Telegram developments, and the distribution of 10 million TONcoins.
Chinese TON Community project founder Tooz Wu said the testnet is called "testnet3" and is based on the official Telegram Open Network (TON) test network, often called "testnet2". Since the developer of TON said that the platform's testnet would be closed by August 1, 2020, the Chinese community invited users to join the new testnet as validators and continue using the network. Ace Wu added that in addition to the launch of the test network, TON Community is conducting a free distribution of 10 million TONcoins that will be used on the main network. All users of the Telegram messenger can take part in the distribution.
Ace Wu first spoke about plans to launch a test network of the project back in May, while criticizing another community, which in the same month launched the Free TON blockchain based on Telegram developments without the participation of the company. The head of TON Community added that the project is already going international, and a significant proportion of its participants are citizens of Russia, China and Singapore.
Recall that on May 12, Telegram founder Pavel Durov announced the termination of work on the TON platform after a lost "legal battle" with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). Last fall, the agency accused Telegram of illegally holding an ICO, considering Gram tokens to be unregistered securities. After lengthy litigation, the court completely blocked the distribution of Gram tokens for both US citizens and foreign investors. However, the original developers of TON stated that the main developments on the TON code are in the public domain and can be used by anyone who supports decentralization.
Last week, SEC Commissioner Hester Peirce, also known as a "crypto mom" for being friendly to the cryptocurrency industry, criticized the SEC for prosecuting Telegram.