Bitcoin Forum

Hello, I just received an email that my email was changed on my account(lakimens)
https://i.imgur.com/mJbyyUM.png

I haven't sent/posted a Bitcoin address, mainly because I don't use Bitcoin.
The address that is on my profile is for an altcoin, PRiVCY, I'm in an airdrop with it.
The previous address that was on my profile was my Ethereum address, I can also prove ownership of that.
Please help. My account has 390+ activity, more than a year of active posting. My account is locked right now, because I didn't want the hacker ruining it.

You can prove you own the account by signing a message with that address.

I am afraid without a singed bitcoin address you have not much chance to get the account back. However if you have an ETH address quoted by another member then you can sign that address and give it a try. I guess global mods can unlock lock accounts.

In case you do not know how to sign a message for ETH address:

Admins don't accept signed messages from eth addresses. Only a bitcoin signed message/PGP message might get an account recovered.

And addresses on a profile don't count,as they can be changed anytime.

For a locked account I guess a Global Moderator can unlock it. Not 100% sure but I guess I have seen somewhere hilary posted it. Excuse in advance if I am wrong for both hilary and Global Moderator  :)

I've posted my ETH Address here (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=3131155.msg35599017#msg35599017).
Should I try signing it?

Quoted for reference.
In spreadsheet (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1lgqQnqhSqvu7GhSaM88S6y3Dc_IcsqvbxMis3HBJnxk/edit#gid=976895053) raw #212 (http://prntscr.com/k42ywp) which means the above ETH has not been altered.

---

Yes, you do.

That post in only a couple months old, it probably won't be accepted as proof.

The address looks legit, it hasn't been changed. Have a look on my last post. I have undated it with the spreadsheet of the bounty and screenshot.

Are you sure your account is only locked? If yes, do sign a message, if hilariousandco/some other global mod finds it enough to unlock your account, then do so. Sign a message saying this:


And, for the love of god don't fill the above quote just like that. Sign a real message,and post it here. To sign an eth message ,go here: https://www.myetherwallet.com/signmsg.html

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Yeah, hilariousandco can. I don't know about other global mods tho.

That's a relief  for me. Thanks for the confirmation. I KNEW IT!  :P

Thanks for the help guys!
Post it here? I thought I should message Cyrus as per this  (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=497545.0)thread.
I'll post it here too.

Post it here too.

-----BEGIN ETHEREUM SIGNED MESSAGE-----
My account lakimens has been hacked/lost. Please reset the email to lakiwow@live.com. The current date is July 9th, 2018.
-----BEGIN SIGNATURE-----
0x6eFcd70406f36b7E0fEB0bcDf80F834906bd4e0f
-----END ETHEREUM SIGNED MESSAGE-----

Here is the unedited post where I posted that address:

quoted and verified  (http://prntscr.com/k434lw) successfully.

Does anyone know how much time it usually takes for mods to reply to my message or unlock my account?
I'm in this Signature campaign and I need 5 posts to receive the reward.

No one knows. Usually it takes weeks even months. All you can do is keep bumping this post every after 24 hours and patiently wait. Good luck.

Okay, so you seem to know this forum. Why haven't they changed the software?
No 2FA, email and password change without email verification..

I am fairly familiar however like you, we all are also wondering about all these. We discussed about all these in various topics, several times. Have a look...

I guess it's not a priority for theymos at the moment.

Maybe he doesn't have enough time or something else, but I think there's a lot of people that would love to work on this forum. I think you're one of those people.

How to sign my Bitcoin Address?
I would like to do it in order to keep my account safely and for later use in the worst case when I lose control on my account.
Thanks.

I just looked through all my posts, there isn't another one.
I will surely cry if I don't get it back, 392 days and 750++ posts..

Well, this is depressing.

This will help you to learn the stuffs

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The only thing you can do is - keep bumping the topic after every 24 hours and hope an admin/mod notice it and unlock it. There are no such time frame unfortunately. Good luck mate.

Thanks mate.

Do you know how your account was hacked? My password and email was changed at a similar time, and I haven't logged in for a long time.
Also, my password is secure. Imho seems like there is a security issue with the forum in general?

I think it's a security issue too, because I saw quite a few accounts hacked by the same IP address. Password and email changed too.
This is the address, 78.26.198.233. My email was changed to a YopMail email.
This forum software is 10 years old so no surprise if it's a security issue.

Lol, This happened because of the following reasons,

- OP used his/her password somewhere else the one he used for his BCT account.
- He got phished or social engineered.
- He got rekt by RAT.

I don't think there's anything else to happen, correct me if I'm wrong.

I mean, that's the higher possibility, but this forum is anything, BUT secure. 2FA would've helped, email change confirmation would've helped.
The software is 10 years old and yeah, maybe it's been upgraded, but this wouldn't be the first hack that happened to it, there are a few big ones that are public information.

Please admins, I am losing money on my PRiV airdrop and I was really depending on that money..

Well, good thing is, at the end of this, I'll have another nicely built account.

Positive thinking, expel all the demons.

Yea 2fa should work for sure, It doesn't matter even if the software is 10 years old Theymos keeps updating the code himself.
There's also a bug bounty thread for bitcointalk by theymos. https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=309785.0

I see, still doesn't explain why we don't have 2FA yet.

Think positive and positive things will happen to you.

At least Bitcoin is on the rise.

wrong. hilariousandco can not. I have pmed him the signed message and a request to unlock my account but he told me to contact theymos and cyrus. which means i will most likely never get it back although providing all proof as requested!!!

Are you sure? That's what I found:


I see Cyrus recovering a few accounts from time to time. You should just wait.

interesting. I wonder, what does restoring an account means?
I locked my account immediately after it was hacked. and all i need is to get it back on track, does it involve only unlocking or also restoring?

Unless Theymos and Cyrus make an exception for you to recover this account , you have no chance.
I read somewhere "mprep" saying Theymos did not give any guidelines for staked ETH address for taking as valid proof.

It is bitcoin forum, Theymos will ask for bitcoin staked address only.
Might your proof /validity may help in DT to tag that account.

Lol, it was a bitcoin forum back in 2009, now it's a multi-coin forum and you can't expect everyone to have a bitcoin wallet.

Halp Plox!

Supposedly any address of a decent altcoin (not easily 51%able) should do. It's not a multi-coin forum tho to be honest... the altcoin section was added because it was the only way to contain everyone coming in here creating altcoin posts in a Bitcoin forum, so out of convenience the containment board for alts was created.

As far as you recovering an account without a Bitcoin address posted in a previous unedited comment/posted in a locked thread, it's next to impossible.

There is people that have been waiting for months, even more than a year, and they signed not one but several bitcoin addresses, and theymos or Cyrus don't see these cases/simply cannot be bothered to recover the accounts. It is insane? indeed, but what can you do? it has been discussed several times that new staff should be doing this job to speed the queue up, attempts of such were unfruitful. I think there's no point in your case.

I know there are quite a few accounts left unattended to and that is what I fear may be coming for me, from what I read 99% of the people don't get their accounts back.

Considering that your account isn't an Hero account or above and you don't have the bitcoin address staked, unedited or in a locked thread, I wouldn't even bother to be honest.


This guy for instance:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=2251399.0

Several verified messages on bitcoin addresses posted years ago, unedited or locked thread otherwise, all good. Apparently still no word from theymos or Cyrus. He will soon have 1 year of wait, probably a record, it's one of the longest waits I've ever seen with compelling evidence presented, and it's an Hero account to boot. So with examples like this, there's no hope for the average case of lost account unfortunately.

The average case, right? That's more than a year's worth of activity lost. You know what grinds my gears? There's no security options on this forum, something like 2FA or verifying an email change through the old email... Not even sure if it's my fault I got hacked, this forum software is 10 years old..

A very long time is under consideration. I myself am waiting for the restoration of my account from February
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=3000966.

A couple of months ago there were some improvements in security via email address:



So if something warning happens you will get noticed and have the possibility to lock your account yourself to avoid the hacker joining signature campaigns and wrecking around.

Of course, this does not change the fact that after you lock it, the nightmare begins in which you will be waited and indefinite amount of time waiting for either Cyrus or theymos to restore it back to you.

There's no workaround for this that I can think off, other than some automation + hiring more people to check the cases.

The security on this forum is a utter joke, i've tried messaging multiple admins but never have I once gotten a response back. lost an account from years back to some scumbag in denmark that is active on my account/shilling fake projects. All the hacker had to do was change the email address on file and I had no way to access my account.

If I had known that locking my account will be this hellfire I am experiencing now, I wouldn't lock it. After I locked it, I opened yopmail.com and saw that you can use any email you want there without any password, so I could reset my password and email, but I locked it and now I am in hell.
Just send me an email like:
"Your email has been changed"
"Your email has been changed to XXX, if this wasn't you, click here to revert the change."
It's so fucking simple.

"We've improved security by giving you a chance to lock your account forever, but we'll never EVER unlock it for you, fuck you"
I had a better chance of asking the hacker nicely to hand over my account..

I think there is small chance to get recover nowadays so just create another account for your own good.
The lesson is very expensive !

Yeah, it's pretty dumb actually. At least you avoid people impersonating you, but yes, it's kind of pointless if you don't get to recover the account.

The link should lock it once clicked, and then when you try to access your locked account, you would be asked to reset the password, which you would receive in your email (these automatically generated passwords, so you receive it, then you change it for a better password once you can access). The process is automated.

This is the case where the forum password gets stolen, but they (hackers) can't access the email.

If they can access the email, then you are screwed, which is why we should have an alternative email, in case we lose one, we can recover the email with the second one. Recovery email it's better than an SMS, more private, I don't personally want to involve my phone number or anything like that in here, too many scammers.

We just need to automate password recovery, not only locking the account.

When in doubt, if someone that isn't the real owner obtains access through the automated system, the real owner will simply come in here and sign a BTC address.


On a long enough timeline everyone gets their password compromised, even satoshi. We can't have perfect security with emails/passwords.

The light at the end of the tunnel. This is either a very, very long tunnel, or I am going through it at the speed of a snail.

Believe and you will achieve.

Why do I even try?

Based on your post, it seems like someone knows the password of your bitcointalk account, because technically he couldn't change the email address if he didn't log in, I don't know how did that happen, but I think maybe you accidentally said it to someone you knew or the password of your account is so easy to guess, for that to happen. Anyways, be more extra careful next time and use signed in message for safety purposes.

Even if someone did know the password.. Give me 2FA, give me an option to undo the changed email address, give me customer support... Nah, fuck you lakimens.

Well, goodbye lakimens, have fun in the depths of the database, dead, but not forgotten.

Try again, I guess?

Apparently, there's an account recovery email, it only shows it when you try to reset the password on a locked account.