Lost Treasure: Cases of Lost Bitcoin Assets

The “decentralized” nature of Bitcoin (BTC) and other cryptocurrencies has many advantages, not least in terms of privacy and avoiding the fees and cumbersome bureaucratic hurdles of fiat currency exchanges.

But this feature is also a “double-edged sword”, which makes users bear a lot of responsibility.

For example, if you store cryptocurrencies in a cold wallet, you need to remember your password to access your cryptocurrencies.

Without a password, your tokens remain locked. If you accidentally lost the device that stored the key… then… you can only say goodbye to your encrypted assets!

It is estimated that approximately 20% of all bitcoins in circulation today (18.5 million bitcoins at the time of writing) are actually locked away in lost wallets and cannot be accessed.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing for traders (scarcity drives up prices), but the sympathy goes out to the poor losers.

How many bitcoins did they lose? Let’s take a look at the top five cases with the highest amount of money lost.

1. Satoshi Nakamoto: 1.1 million bitcoins

In the mythology of cryptocurrency, the inventor of Bitcoin under the alias Satoshi Nakamoto can be said to be unprecedented and unprecedented. What did this visionary “sage” do with the currency he created? Apparently, nothing was done.

In fact, Satoshi seems to have disappeared entirely, leaving behind a huge fortune of over 1 million Bitcoins.

By rights, Satoshi Nakamoto should be one of the richest men in the world, but he doesn’t seem interested in their money. This is how it happened?

Maybe the genius just lost the verification information, or maybe Satoshi Nakamoto is the ultimate long-term coin holder.

People like to imagine the second coming of mythical beings, and if Satoshi Nakamoto returned and started moving his funds, it would shake up the entire financial industry.

2. Individual X: 69000 Bitcoins

Back in 2018, a group of hackers listed the 6,900 bitcoins on the dark web.

The password for this fund is unknown, and other purchased hackers must try to crack the password themselves, which can be said to be similar to a challenge.

The wallet changed hands several times before the U.S. Department of Justice stepped in to seize it, claiming to know that the owner, identified in the documents as “Individual X,” was a cybercriminal who stole large amounts of encryption from the black market platform Silk Road.

Regardless of whether X attempted to hide or transfer the stolen funds, the involvement of the federal government made it unlikely that the wealth would be recovered.

3. James Howells: 7,500 bitcoins

James Howells was an early cryptocurrency user who amassed 7,500 bitcoins, which he stored on his laptop hard drive before throwing it away by mistake in 2013.

Howells has recently attracted a lot of attention in his native England for trying to get Newport Town Council to help him recover his lost wallet.

He offered the council 25% of his wallet and an extra £50m for a new crown relief fund if the Welsh town’s local authority let him search for a lost laptop in a landfill.

Unfortunately, Howells’ petition was rejected due to issues with permits and environmental regulations, as well as the slim chances of successful excavation, which itself would cost millions of pounds. Sometimes it’s too late.

4. Stefan Thomas: 7,002 bitcoins

Bay Area tech worker Stefan Thomas made the ultimate mistake that any professional IT professional should know well: He forgot his password. Unfortunately, that password protects over 7,002 bitcoins (or over $200 million).

Unfortunately, Stephen put the bitcoins on a password-protected USB stick in 2011, and then forgot the password information.

After entering the password eight times out of 10, Stephen tried to find the last two passwords on social media.

Unfortunately, these attempts all ended in failure, and Stephen lost his millions. In a statement, Stephen said he had “accepted” what had happened. Would you have the same attitude if you were him?

5. Gerald Cotten: Funding still unknown

Canadian financier Gerald Cotten is CEO and co-founder of the QuadrigaCX exchange, an obscure exchange where 95% of trades are apparently made by Gerald himself in a series of Performed under a dizzying number of aliases.

Cotton ran the company as a “Ponzi scheme,” but died of heart complications in India in 2018 before authorities could catch him, leaving his ill-gotten gains to his wife.

The estate does not allegedly provide the keys to access the cryptocurrencies (the funds are said to be worth over $230 million!) Rumor has it that the devious criminal faked his own death and is now in hiding.

Trade Cryptocurrencies Safely with StormGain

These cases of forgotten passwords and lost hard drives illustrate the importance of using a secure crypto exchange with a custodial wallet.

StormGain has tens of millions of users in more than 150 countries around the world, and is widely trusted by everyone.

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