Bitcoin Forum

According to CipherTrace Almost $1B (69.370 BTC) has been moved for the first time since 2015 from Silk Road wallet. I believe the police finally cracked it down.
https://ciphertrace.com/nearly-1b-from-silk-road-move-for-first-time-since-2015/
 

An anonymous crypto user has just moved 69,370 Bitcoin from an address associated with the Silk Road darknet market, that more recently has become a popular hacking target.

According to a Nov. 3 report from crypto intelligence firm CipherTrace, the recent movement involving two transactions adding up to 69,370 Bitcoin (BTC) — or more than $960 million at the time of publication — originated from an address connected with the Silk Road marketplace, which was shut down in 2013. The crypto user first sent 1 BTC — likely as a test transaction — before moving the bulk of the coins.

Ciphertrace speculated the anonymous user made the transactions “to stay up to date with the Bitcoin network” by switching between address formats. As the last time anyone moved funds associated with the defunct darknet market was in April 2015, the BTC wallet would reportedly also have access to all Bitcoin Cash (BCH) and Bitcoin SV (BSV) associated with the tokens’ hard forks.

However, the firm didn’t rule out hacking as a possibility: “These movements could possibly mean that the wallet owner is moving funds to new addresses to prevent hackers from accessing the wallet.dat file or that hackers have already cracked the file.”

https://cointelegraph.com/news/1b-of-bitcoin-from-silk-road-wallet-moves-for-first-time-since-2015

So, I do not yet know how police are involved, because they are not.

We don't know about the police or some other government agency involvement because it's not in the media yet but with so much attention to this wallet chances are high that it's under gov control.

I don't think it is a hack at all and tend to agree with the statement in the Ciphertrace article that the owner of the legacy address decided to move his Bitcoin to Bech32 address. In case there was a hack, I believe the hackers would have already made plans how to wipe the coins clean prior to moving them out of the original address. So far they are just sitting there, not going to exchanges or mixers.   

Third-party companies create the majority of bitcoin wallets and only wallets from the Bitcoin core team are closest to Bitcoin technology so it can be said that it is more reliable than the software on the market.
The news above is also outdated and currently, there is not any bad news regarding Bitcoin wallets. We shouldn't worry too much about it.

This is just speculation at this point, as no sources are present to verify what really happened nor are there leads regarding the movement of those coins. While crypto in itself is secure, your security is still as good as how you make it to be and what you do with it. If I own a vault with a passcode to unlock it, I wouldn't keep the combination on locations wherein people can access it, nor will I try to give a hint to someone else about the passcode. Relate it to crypto wallets and you still get the same idea. Even with these fancy cryptographic algorithms safeguarding the wallet, if your private key files is exposed to the elements, or if your online activities expose your computer to malwares, you're always doomed to get hack.

This is interesting and pretty huge. Silk road have been the biggest darknet store for quite some time now and it's pretty obvious hackers have their eyes on such things always. But my question is why haven't any authority been able to trace out the location of Silk Road? What is it that they do special which ensures anonymity for them? Moreover if hackers are able to crack this wallet why haven't any authority has been able to do any such thing?

the amount is incredibly high.  Despite the high amount, the fee paid is very low.  His acting after a long time caused such thoughts.  Do you think there is a possibility of hacking?

This wallet was on Internet for years. Hackers were trying to break it's passphrase. Even this wallet is sold in All private keys forum. (https://allprivatekeys.com/wallet.dat)

But I don't think this is hacked. I believe it's recovered by owners. It requires huge computing powers to break passphrase. Also I there was no clue. So, I believe owners/security agency recovered the fund.

This pure speculative news. Remember when it was getting hacked by the police and there will be an official statement about what institution that's successfully hacked the wallet.

I do think that there's a possibility for hacking but it's not always become the plot twist. Remember we have seen big whale has been moving its bitcoin last week and it's worth more than this. I personally doubt if that's always related to the hacking case. It's likely the owner was sending it to the new wallet. 

if that's the hacked case maybe the biggest one in the crypto history

Interesting News. now they are either moved by police officials or this wallet is hacked and hacker is doing this activity. i hope more news will come about this.
BTW this wallet has also BCH and BSV and all the other forks done in that duration:
so
$1 Billion+ BTC
$16 Million BCH
$1 Million BSV
and tons of other forks with hundreds of thousands of dollars worth value.

Only the government authorities have such huge computing powers, I doubt any private hackers or even a pool of hackers are able to do it.

No wonder why this might be happening if we see the bitcoin prices are moving upwards, moreover the person might have done his part of waiting and now wants to sell some portion in this worst time?

There are endless possibilities for the speculation since the amount of bitcoin that is moved is huge one. Also, if he was so much patient to hold such amount of bitcoin then he/she could be big personality with strong portfolio in the developer field, otherwise why would they believe in the bitcoin even when the we already had highest BTC surge back in 2017 with (19K USD ATH).

https://www.coindesk.com/u-s-seized-more-than-1b-in-silk-road-linked-bitcoin-seeks-forfeiture-bloomberg

Looks like it were the long arm of the law, which is v long indeed.

This time around their auctions are going to attract some proper heavyweights. And if anyone says 'Omigod they gon' buy 'em all to dump on Yobit on us runferyerlives' - I will grab their nipples and twist.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/justice-department-seizes-1-billion-in-recently-moved-silk-road-crypto

In a filing from Wednesday, the Department of  Justice asked to seize $1 billion from an unnamed hacker. Specifically, the DoJ is asking the court of the Northern District of California to lock down on: "Approximately 69,370.22491543 Bitcoin (BTC), Bitcoin Gold (BTG), Bitcoin SV (BSV), Bitcoin Cash (BCH), obtained from 1HQ3Go3ggs8pFnXuHVHRytPCq5fGG8Hbh."

The address used by the hackers is linked with the Silk Road darknet market that more recently has become a popular hacking target.

What's the betting that every remaining SR coin eventually winds up in the hands of the government? And then the fat cats who buy them at auction. Quite an amusing fate considering their origins.

The U.S. is suing for the forfeiture of thousands of Bitcoins, totaling more than $1 billion, that it seized on Tuesday.

The cryptocurrency seizure, tied to the Silk Road marketplace, is the largest the U.S. has ever made, the Justice Department said in a statement on Thursday.

The seizure takes a swath of the digital cryptocurrency out of circulation at least temporarily, likely contributing to an increase of about 7% in its price, to about $15,200, on Thursday. In the past, federal authorities have auctioned off seized Bitcoins, but usually months after acquiring them.

The authorities seized the funds from an unknown hacker who had gained access to them, according to the statement. The Bitcoin address at which they probably seized the currency is the fourth-richest in the world, according to BitInfoCharts. Researcher Elliptic flagged that the funds were on the move on Tuesday.

The funds were associated with the Silk Road website, which used Bitcoin to peddle everything from drugs to murder-for-hire until it was shut down by U.S. agents in 2013. Silk Road, operated by Ross William Ulbricht starting in January 2011, used Bitcoins to generate the equivalent of $1.2 billion in illicit sales and reap $80 million in commissions in less than three years, according to court documents.

from

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-11-05/u-s-seeks-forfeiture-of-bitcoin-valued-at-over-1-billion

https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/7319611-Complaint.html

How can this happen? the Wallet itself or the PC that holds the addresses got hacked?

If the wallet itself got hacked, I mean if the hackers bruteforced the private keys, which is practically impossible but theoretically is not, then it is pretty fucked up.

Either way I don't think I believe it.

Identify the person. Drop extremely heavy legal threats. They roll over and give up their holdings?

It usually works in most cases. There must've been some sort of smoking gun for them to think they had no other option. I guess we may find out some day. More often than not these people make some laughable mistake that gives them up just as Ross did.

I was thinking the same. Besides, not every heavy transaction should be tagged as a "hack". Even tho they were sent to an exchange, it still isn't enough reason for such a conclusion.

Stellar reporting from bloomberg, yet again.


So he got caught because he sent a small portion of the coins to his BTC-e account, one that must have been easy to tie to his real identity.

Ah. So it was stolen from Silk Road. Didn't catch that bit before. I wonder if handing it over may be the end of it for them. It's not as if Ross is going to sue them. A slightly high price to pay for an easy life.

What's the amount of American law enforcement involvement in BTC-e?

What a conscious hackers! At first they were able to hack into a BTC wallet... Then, oh miracle, made a trial transaction of 1 BTC! LOL... And then transferred the rest of the amount! ;D
Well, at the end of their work they decided to return everything to the government! Well done!

How in general can believe such stories from the media?

Stellar Bloomberg job, as you said, malevolent. They never need to retract anything either, just keep the editors and Wall Street board members happy but hey, who can blame them? Been in that unenviable position before meself!

Anyway, what a month it'll be for Individual X. #noenvy

The American intelligence services noted that this is the largest amount for the entire existence of cryptocurrencies that they have confiscated. And now the most interesting thing begins - who exactly will become the owner of all this fabulous wealth ??

They have at least a partial BTC-e database which leaked years ago, and also possibly wex's database, this year NZ authorities have also frozen $90M worth of fiat, perhaps Americans will put their hands on it to cover a portion of the fine that BTC-e has been issued.


Probably the US Department of Justice? The bitcoins are going to be auctioned, of course.

Either chainanalysis got really strong now, or the hacker made some serious mistakes when handling the stolen coins, and it's probably the latter, because otherwise we'd see a lot of stolen coins suddenly being identified. This kinda shows us that no one is immune from mistakes, even people who are l33t enough to steal billions of dollars worth of coins.


Someone who will buy them from the auction, obviously. I'm sure there won't be a shortage of people willing to buy the coins, especially if they will be sold at a slightly below market price.

There are still very much secure crypto vaults around the industry. I think what just happened is someone not comfortable with the legacy wallet for storage and tend to move into another, which is always a recommended. The possibility of we see this a hacking scenario shows that reading is not our culture. This movement should be aim at having their funds secure into a better place without issue. Although, there have been rumors going around that the US government has made some plans to auction some of their Bitcoin in possession, but isn't clear if this is associated with the information. 

Maybe it is really not hacked. Just like everyone else thinks maybe old owner finally recover his wallet for a long period of time, or maybe he will put that amount to another wallet or maybe he is up to something, maybe he will create his project and needed funds, or he will convert his bitcoin into another altcoin in the market. If government is the reason behind this   1B is really a big deal, once they finally sell it in lower amount, the chat may crash and might get dump badly I think.

I also have the same doubt. Silk Road was a very sophisticated marketplace. I don't think that it is something that Ross Ulbricht can create alone. Also, there were tens of thousands of vendors and it would have been impossible for him to manage all of them. I assume at least a dozen people were involved in running Silk Road and they vanished once Ross was caught. Probably the temptation to cash out, finally overpowered their zeal to remain anonymous.

In that conversation you can find the most intriguing version of what might have happened back then. We would probably never know the real explanation but this one stands out for me.

that was my original assumption, and is probably the case. after reading through the pleadings though, i'm not actually sure. the US attorney only says


......which makes me wonder if he leaked his identity in other ways.

 I wonder how they can afford to pay people social security checks every month.  Hopefully, it will go into that.