Bitcoin Forum

http://www.bitcoinfuturesguide.com/uploads/6/4/6/5/64656757/5208407_orig.png (http://www.bitcoinfuturesguide.com/uploads/6/4/6/5/64656757/5208407_orig.png)

This is a totally bizarre story from Cryptsy (http://blog.cryptsy.com/post/140958011712/recovery-bounty-contract). A PDF (https://cryptsy.com/cryptsyrecoverybountyfinal.pdf) has been posted of a contract that Big Vern (Paul Vernon) signed, in Florida, for getting the 13,000 lost coins that were reported hacked (http://www.bitcoinfuturesguide.com/bitcoin-blog/cryptsy-finally-admits-to-operating-fractional-reserve-exchange-makes-excuses-due-to-shutdown). The deal is to pay 1750 BTC for that, with contingencies to get the lost LTC and other litecoins._

Why anybody would trust trading on that site after all that has happened, I don't know. Since last year (http://www.bitcoinfuturesguide.com/bitcoin-blog/psa-bitcoin-and-altcoin-exchange-cryptsy-is-possibly-a-scam-not-processing-bitcoin-withdrawals) we have been warning of issues from Cryptsy.

this can not be believable, How come the hackers would return 13000 btc for taking 1750 btc only while they can keep the whole amount without returning !! And this proofs that there is no actual hacking that happen and it was a scam exit that was faked by cryptsy

its called trying to create a paper trail to make the "supposed" hack seem like a real thing. by showing that there is a possibility that there are people that know about the hack.

they dont have to prove who is now holding the funds or how they were obtained. but by making a basic paper trail that corresponds to the story that it was hacked and people are trying to find the funds. then it can be used to validate a legitimate bankruptcy claim when the funds are not found. and also simultaniously used to say he is pennyless to avoid large dicorve settlement with his ex-wife.

IF its an inside job, then by handing back a percentage of the coins the insider can avoid jailtime and still be $700k better off by keeping the reward, which would be great timing for bigvern. to suddenly become liquid again professionally (the coins are returned) and personally keeping the reward, after his divorce agreement is settled.

in short its a win win. the 'supposed' loss of liquidity was perfectly timed for his divorce. and he can either file bankruptcy by not having the funds return, leaving him scot free of law and his ex-wife. or he can now let the funds return and go back to business scot free of his ex-wife

in short IF insider job. keep $5.3mill and always be looking over shoulder for rest of life, not only by ex-wife investigating but also authorities and customers. or return $4.5m keep $700k and be at peace. settle all debates/debts with authorities, ex-wife and customers

yes, this is just a cover up for cryptsy, site like cryptsy would do stories in order for them not to pay people invested with them. hmmm. oh cryptst where did my coins go?  ???

Cryptsy cannot still be operational, seriously is it?  nah its not just checked, story sounds fake, as has been said why would theives give back 13000 to receive 1750, it dosnt make sense.

So does this news mean people with money at Cryptsy will get something back or it's just more dust in the eyes to make the owner of Cryptsy not at fault for the missing funds?

Steal and then return. How noble! How about those who robbed Mt Gox?

Sounds like this is cryptsy basically letting everyone know that it definitely wasnt hackers that took down the site but was in fact cryptsy themselves . No hackers going to agree to returning btc when theres no need to.

So that hackers (or Cryptsy) made 1750BTC for just (STEP1) announcing the news on being hacked and been able to (STEP2) pursue hacker to returned the stolen coins.

I guess the hackers should also let everyone know how they hack the site so that other exchanges can learn from this?

Why would the hackers return the stolen cash and just accept a fraction of the sum when they could have walked off with almost 13 times the proposed reward? Sounds very fishy to me.

It never gets boring in crypto land...

Although if he's really getting a divorce then I can kind of understand what's going through his head. It's all very weird though.

unless there was somehow a paper trail to the hackers, it makes no sense that they would be returning 5 million dollars and keep only 700k.

This seems all too perfect of an outcome for there to have actually been a hack, I have a feeling that, as mentioned by other people in the topic, this is a cover up and they're planning to run off with the $400k or whatever and be the "heros" and return the remaining Bitcoin.

Not really something that hard to see through, to be honest.

This. Seems odd they would bother returning it creating another trail.  If they do get the 13000 btc and altcoins back that were lost maybe people will see some coins returned to them, so that is good news. 

i doubt that it is possible right now? who would return 100 per cent of the money for just ten per cent of it? either way the hackers wont be uncovered most probably

it seems to be a little bit fishy to me though it is very interesting how it will turn out in the future

Indeed, in my opinion this is just a whole scam operation that is going right now, they just want to look like its fair and did nothing wrong.
The just scammed everyone but do not want to looks like to fake so they are doing this.

Yes for some reason this sound fishy to me too.
I read that the hackers did not had any plans to use the stolen coins but it was just a message to warn cryptsy.

That is crazy....!  :o

Never will I believe that bs story!!
I still believe this is a scam done by cryptsy themselves.

I doubt there can be any peace even if some document is signed, I assume it is already investigated as a crime by authorities, so nothing can be changed here. Now imagine instead of stollen BTC, someone is kidnapped and he is going to be freed for 1750 BTC and some signed document. It is obvious once crime is investigated by authorities, nothing can change, so doesnt make sence returning the BTC back unless it is inside job to make Cryptsy liquid and operational again.

No date on the signature, no printed name, no witnesses and no notarization.

Absolutely no way to authenticate anything.


Yep sounds legit


 ;D ;D ;D


~BCX~

It would be great to know how this contact between Vern and "hackers" was made. I highly doubt they would contact him and risk to be caught if nothing else. It looks like Vern and those "hackers" know each other very well. Quite interesting story but i dont think selling fairy tales can get him of the hook.

That's lovely. I do enjoy a happy ending to a sad story. Congratulations to the operators for getting the coins. Congratulations to the hacker for making a profit while doing the 'right' thing. Jolly good.

Your optimism is charming like a Hugh Grant romanitc comedy. Remember those?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1396267.60

Yeah, like that hasn't been done before. Remember Bitcoinica? Here's the thread: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=95795.0

Exactly so that other exchanges can learn from this!

Someone cooked the books here. Giving back those Bitcoins is giving away free money. Perhaps the hackers thought they couldn't keep the Bitcoins for a large amount of time (about to get caught) and wanted to dump them while they could.

who cares? BTC is mainly used for illegal things so why do you complain about a "nice" exit?  ;D

you are keep using shit exchangers like BTC-e, Bitfinex, BTC China and so on...why do cry for losing your funds when you know what BTC involves, RISK :)

Honestly On the agreement part, it doesn't look legit to me. Lacks professionalism. If Paul for one seconds, is thinking of by giving back what he owed after all this time, he could open up the exchange once again, then it's not going to work and certainly it looks like a made up story. The best thing for him, is to return everything and then quit the scene (for good).

On a side note:
You have a small typo error on your site, wherein says: be back in Cryptosy's posession (an excess o)

When the piss-poor excuse of 'hackers stole our BTC' was followed by 'we'll give a 1.5k+ BTC reward to whomever returns it', I knew this was all an inside job by the pathological liar BigFern. He (or someone he's working with) will simply return all the funds in question, and make off with the rest (aka 'bounty').

This is pathetic....looks like Vern is now 1750BTC richer, and no one will bat an eyelid.

https://secure.static.tumblr.com/1cae944293de943c3f4b0ea6eb90f2d0/eea5syf/JHCntmnk3/tumblr_static_b5s6sj7jaaok8k0scocw8gows_640_v2.gif
"Yeahhhhhhhh! Offer a 1K BTC bounty to the crypto community for information leading to recovery of ~13K BTC, ignore all viable offers by going dark, but come months later to accept a 1,750 BTC bounty by a complete unknown."

i'm pretty sure that anybody who knows anything doesn't believe a word of this crap. but in the end, crypto is the wild west. whatcha gonna do, eh?

after i read the contract, so at this moment hacker can stole private key from bitcoin address..?
bitcoin not safe again?

lol. That's what hackers do.

Except in this case, Big Vern tried to exit scam from his exchange and bounce to China, never to be heard from again..... but he got cold feet.

Maybe his wife stole them, and they are getting back tgether. :)

Very interested to see how this plays out.. Ofcourse I would never ever use cryptsy again if they manage to get back up on their feet, but if they get back most of the coins, it is very good news for it's users that got burned and have not been able to withdraw.

I don't think Vern is up to this plan and some sort of "long con" by setting this up himself. It still brings way too much heat to him and he will still never recover fully from the blow. The only thing that he gains are potentially lesser charges or less people the class action suit.

Regarding the 10% bounty they offered, the fact that it is now higher can be the result of a negotiation from the person offering their services. It does not have to be something fishy directly.

Let's hope for everybody with locked funds in there that this gets resolved sooner rather than later.

stop fudding, there are plenty fo merchants that accept bitcoin and now even steam is on track, do you think those are selling illegal stuff?

it's the criminal that choose the currency not the opposite, bitcoin has nothing to do with criminal activity

http://www.bitcoinfuturesguide.com/uploads/6/4/6/5/64656757/6686697_orig.png

http://www.bitcoinfuturesguide.com/bitcoin-blog/cryptsy-makes-deal-with-hackers-to-return-stolen-13000-btc-pays-13-fee-to-the-culprit


Eternal Insolent (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=802858) = Lorie Ann Nettles (think homewrecker (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homewrecker))


You figured out yet, Jim Slockney and Paul Vernon, or am I simply being a nutter again?

It is unbelievable that Big Vern thinks this "contract" will help him avoid serious legal trouble. I wish there was a way to have him arrested and locked up in jail tonight.

ROFL, it's like criminals never used USD

That hacker is probably Big Vern himself, thinking he can fool us like an idiot :P
If i were the "real hacker" I will probably hide that bitcoin to myself, why would I give it back to the original owner
That's like you robbed a house last night and then come back again tomorrow saying "hey, I robbed your house yesterday, i can give your TV back if i can have the PS4 instead"
Bullshit ;D
BigVern is attempting a desperate escape with his last weapon apparently

what merchants? Okcupid? LOL

Bitcoin is mainly used for criminal activities, period. You saw that when Silk was closed. The BTC value fell alot at that time. You must be blind or stupid to not see that Bitcoin is a niche e-currency used 95% of black market.

Who are the main "players"? The exchangers. Who is behind the main exchangers? Let's take some examples: BTC-e, BTC China, Okcoin, Bitfinex?

BTC-e is a shady company registered...where? :)  Okcoin is registered in Singapore without any financial license and they are chinesses. :)
Don't take Coinbase example because they DO NOT exist as exchangers. They are TOO small.

It's well known that OKcoin has FAKE volumes but it seems that they control +80% from the BTC exchanges. So, why do you complain that an exchanger like CRYPTSY is trying to exit like that? :)

http://bitcoincharts.com/charts/volumepie/

One does not simply recover "lost" coins with the help of 'a' hacker.


What is the hacker going to do? Hack some BTC addresses to recover said coins? I almost spew my morning coffee over my screens when I read this lol.

make no sense,i dont think this is gonna work,crptsy just try to make every people scammed by them have big hope to return their bitcoins,but the reality is shit,hacker can't give back crptsy bitcoin amount,even its return,it will not fully 100% of lost bitcoin.

But, at least a partial amount also will make a big help to all cryptsy members. But I could not understand how the hackers come for a deal even for half of the amount.

I don't think there really is a deal.  I think this is just a hoax.  If it were true, the coins could easily have been transferred by now.

Even if we take everything said at face value, Cryptsy has made a deal with a random person to pay him a certain amount when he gets the coins back. There has been nothing shown publicly to suggest that there is an possibility of this happening, so I'm not sure why anyone thinks anything will happen or why cryptsy has made any of this public.

Four possibilities(and others, I'm sure):

1)  (75% chance) The "hacker" and Cryptcracker are really Paul Vernon, the money never gets returned, this is all done publicly to make it look like he didn't steal the money, he walks away with the 13,000 bitcoins.

2)  (0.99% chance) The "hacker" and Cryptcracker are really Paul Vernon, the money does get returned, this is all done publicly to make it look like he didn't steal the money, he walks away with the reward of 1750 bitcoins.

3)  (24% chance) The money was really stolen but Cryptcracker doesn't know anything about it and is just trolling us and Paul Vernon.

4)  (0.01 % chance) The money was really stolen and Cryptcraker is telling the truth and Paul Vernon gets the money and returns it.

Is anyone conducting an investigation into the addresses related to this whole fiasco, to try and uncover where all the missing funds went?

This story is really out there. But does anyone really care as long as they manage to finally get their coins out of Cryptsy?  It's not just the BTC anad LTC wallets that are locked. Doge and a whole bunch of others are locked too. There's a lot of coins tied up in there.

You should care because this story being out there shows that you aren't getting your coins back.

Either Cryptsy is putting on a show to make it seem like they are getting the coins back for some reason that won't result in you getting your coins back.

or

They are stupid enough to believe this guy who has offered no proof that he can get the coins back, and are waiting on this jabroni to get the coins back when they could be doing other things that have a chance of working to get the coins back (assuming of course someone actually stole them).

Your coins are gone because you gave them to the wrong person.

You are in this situation because you didn't do anything about the "out there" stories and bullshit reasons they gave for their "technical problems" preventing withdrawals when you could have taken a loss by moving to coins that you could withdraw.

I'm not sure what (if anything) you should be doing instead of listening to this "out there" story, but sitting back and hoping it works out will work out just as well as it did when you did this to the withdrawal problems, and all the other scams that have come before.

Always the same story , first was MT.gox , then was Evolution market in the hidden net beginning of January 2015 ,lose of 12 mln dollar and price of bitcoin was 160 USD at that time, now it is Cryptsy. I hope some day a really honest exchange will show up and they would be happy with getting only their share of profit and not stealing peoples money.

Well 13% doesnt sound bad for me, i lost more in the 2 months where cryptsy hold my coins blocked from trading.

I care more to get the coins back than a small loss, offcourse its fishy but we can debate later if we got something back.
At the Moment we have -> 0 <- Coins refunded.

also like mentioned before everybody involved in BTC/altcoins knows its a risky buisiness because of very high volatility.
So 13% is nothing to me.

ca

So cryptsy seems to be down offline.   Any luck of getting some of our coins back.  Fortunately I only had a few alt. coins left their  not much  but every little bit counts.

Also Bter?  Whats the story with those guys?  Are they ever going to release our pending bit coins and alts?

It has been a month since anyone posted on this topic, why would you revive it.

Cryptsy, assuming they are actually going to return the coins, will likely manually do it over the next little while, or have some announcement about it, don't expect for there to be much other info than that.

Been saying he was behind everything as well, since the beginning...how anyone could believe this wasn't an inside job is beyond me.  What's even more surprising is how this BigFern asshole is still walking free - or walking at all, considering how many people he screwed over.  Hope he gets a big dose of karma soon...

If the hacking was done by outsider, the hacker would have already moved the coins and withdraw.

Cryptsy's site has now been taken down entirely - for a short while it had "under maintenance", but it has now completely gone.

I want my coins back.

Well I think the chance that you get all your coins back is very slim. In the end they will say they were stolen etc. tec.
But for altcoins i am sure they will have to pay out some eventually.

Yes, that would be of interest to me in this case too.

13% of 13,000 BTC would be worth: 1690 BTC at $410 per is a cool $629,000...

If the story is true, then the hackers likely have sent the BTC to all sorts of addresses worldwide, mixed-the-hell out of the coins, spent some, changed them into alts, etc., etc.

"Three gets you five" those coins are gone forever.