Bitcoin Forum

Arvicco and I escrowed a 339.6 BTC transaction using John K. on October 23rd. On October 25th, the transaction was completed and Arvicco requested that John K release the escrowed funds.  From that point until now, we have heard nothing from him.  The maximum contractual duration he allows for funds release is 2 days, and we now a week beyond release request.  You can see that he has not been active since the morning of 10/26:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=31288 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=31288)

We have contacted theymos to ask about how to proceed. He recommended we post publicly, in the hopes that someone might know how to reach out to him.

In most cases, the most likely explanation for this scenario would be easy - the guy disappeared with the money, never to return.  But this is John K. we're talking about. 
Given John's rock-solid reliability as the goto escrow guy for BitcoinTalk, he deserves as much benefit of the doubt as is humanly possible.  The concern is that something may have happened to him in RL. I've racked my brain, and cannot think of a more likely scenario. 

I don't know if John's anonymity is important to him. Without knowing this, I'd like to be cautious and not have any information publicly divulged that might identify him.  Ideally, I won't even need to know this information myself.  My chief concerns are two-fold:
1) Gain an understanding for John K's mid-escrow, extended disappearance.
2) Recover the funds tied up in this escrow.

Could we use this thread as a centralized place to try to share any information that might help get to the bottom of what's going on?  Please mention / share it with anyone that might know him in RL or have alternative means to try to contact him.  Any additional recommendations, please share.

-Chainsaw

This post may be relevant: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=141672.msg3365026#msg3365026

It may be possible that he is having trouble with his new laptop.

The timeline doesn't seem to fit his current leave of absence. Hopefully everything is okay, god speed JK!

I confirm everything said in Chainsaw's post. I can further add that the standard escrow contract we got from JohnK was clearsigned by his signature, as usual. Also, the escrowed funds were not moved, so a hit-and-run account compromise is not likely.

Watching.  John K has always been a solid escrow agent and I have referred many a client to him (as escrow is too low margin and demanding for my tastes).   I hope this is only a situation of unexpected real world issues keeping him "offline". 

Even if everything does turn out "fine" it does illustrate that we really need easy to use multi-sig capabilities.  Before reading the amount of the escrow I was like "not a chance this is fraudulent" the amount made me doubt my first reaction if even a little.  I think 300+ BTC is pushing the limit of what I would trust to any single person in a single tx. Even a service like John's can be enhanced by multi-sig (Buyer, Seller, John, it takes 2 signatures to move funds).    

Thanks a ton for providing that.  It at least provides a plausible scenario that doesn't involve potential RL harm to John. It makes sense that he is putting security foremost. I had scrolled back a bit in his history and saw there were a few errors with refund amounts.  Perhaps upon getting his new computer another error occurred and he is still trying to get everything restored.

As wtfvanity said, the timeline doesn't _quite_ fit...two weeks is a pretty long time to disappear.

It would be priceless if anyone out there has well-established community trust and knows how to contact him in RL to get the story.


Thanks for keeping an eye on this, DeathAndTaxes.
Another refinement that comes to mind is a 'death plan'. This is something that any Bitcoin holder should have - the means to transfer account information on to some other trusted person(s) to prevent lost bitcoins in the event of unexpected death.  Statement of having such a plan in place would provide greater security to escrow clients.

These unexpected events really are opportunities. Opportunities to recognize gaps in the current Bitcoin ecosystem...then filling them in.  I know that a decade from now we'll laugh at how unbelievably primitive the tools we used to use Bitcoins were, starting out.

Hope his OK,

Maybe when he comes back he should create a ALT account that he is happy to log on on a unsecured computer just to give people updates if he has gone away for what ever reason.

Like JohnK-Alt or something.

That doesn't really sound too good. If he does do that, no one should use that person as escrow until; his main account comes back on of course.

Yeah of course don't do any trades, he could even give it a scammer tag or something or a under title saying DO NOT TRADE.

That's another great idea. To be secure, he'd need to confirm identify from his native account, and keep the credentials for the secondary account unique stored only in his head, or otherwise secured by layers additional to those that could cause a breach of his main account.

John is fine, he's just really busy right now. He's got a ton of stuff to take care of, he'll be on as soon as he can.

I've spoken with an individual via PM that is going to get a message to John through RL channels.  Best-case, he will resolve the escrow situation and post a brief "I am still here, no need to worry" message by the end of this weekend.  If that fails to occur, I'll be revisiting this issue on Monday, looking for more recommendations for next steps and timelines from this community.

I'd like to extend a deep, heartfelt thanks to everyone that offered suggestions or help in this so far, no matter how small.

-Chainsaw

Just curious, what was the trade for?

Hookers and blow.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Gd87JmkAkE

He might have actually got into an accident.
I doubt he ran away with those bitcoins, that's a small amount than what he has held on to before.
It's unlikely that it was an accident, but if he got himself injured, hope he's ok.

I know John has been busy with moving and with other things. I wouldn't worry about too much about him running off with your coins. That doesn't change the fact that you have been inconvienced, but hopefully its a little peace of mind.

Until the Bitcoins are where they are supposed to be, then there is worry. If you cant offer the service, stop it till you get your affairs in order, because the parties have trusted the escrow agent and there maybe other payments/promises also being held up....

http://mentaso.com/economics/item/220-the-future-of-escrow.html

What you said here is consistent with the message I received via PM.  If the escrow agent were anyone other than John K, I would be significantly more alarmed than I am in this situation.  Because it is him, the most likely scenario is that the damages will be limited to some personal drama, and a missed opportunity to purchase precious metals.

Best case, we'll come out of this with the escrow ecosystem unharmed, some good ideas for future refinements to the escrow process, and with John having a firmer appreciation of the cascading impacts of dropped commitments.  There's no need for a pound of flesh in this scenario.  The community should come out of the whole ordeal stronger than they began.

Thanks once again to all that shared their pieces of information.  Having a plausible scenario to explain John's disappearance (especially one that does not involve him having been involved in an accident) provides as much peace of mind as is possible in the interim.

It's not the amount of bitcoins, it's the amount multiplied by the exchange rate. 

I hope he is OK as well.

this is sadly the problem with using escrow.. however i am very surprised he dosnt have another person or 2 keeping everything in check, hell he seems to have planned for everything else
hope hes ok though dont recall the last time he was away from here for more than a few days

I've recently used John K for a 500 btc escrow. I seriously doubt he would compromise his reputation intentionally.

I probably shouldn't be quoting the Staff forum, but in this case I see no harm.

Is he still absent?

This is accurate as far as I know.

I don't have a ton of personal info on him, but I'll release what I do have in a few days. Hopefully he's OK. He just came the the US, so if he was injured or arrested, we might not hear about it (and he might need our help).

Good news.

John K logged on, replied, and released the escrow funds today.

Thanks again to all who contributed information in the interim.

I tell everyone I'm usually offline on weekends. I lost 2/7ths of business that way (maybe more).

We're still waiting on John to refund the rest of ragingazn's asic chip group buy thread here. (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=177994.2020)

If anyone has seen or heard from him, please let him know. Thanks.

I have a small sum from sale of goods pending release.

I did see him come online on my email and whatsapp.
He never replied to me too.
Not sure why he's still busy nowadays.

Well I did remind him to have a BCP in place, in case he was busy or away.

Still waiting. He hasn't logged in since 11/3.... does anybody know if he went out of town or something? I'm starting to get nervous.

He did mention an offline lawyer who was supposed to be his backup, and has instructions on how to do the escrow. But that was when he was still in Malaysia.

Nice!  That must have been a relief.

Dabs, if you have the contact details for this lawyer, perhaps we could consider a reasonable timeframe in which to approach them?

You guys might want to checkout bit2factor (http://www.bit2factor.org/) the next time you want to use an escrow service. The website is an implementation of BIP38 (https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/BIP_0038). Also, it might be useful to check out bitescrow (http://www.bitescrow.org/).

Those websites aren't might, but they look very promising as far as I can see.

2-of-3 multisig escrow is also possible in Bitcoin-Qt now, though it's a little complicated. I recommend multisig for large escrows.

theymos, do you have any idea where John is, or when he might return?

I suppose that he's busy with school. But I haven't talked to him.

You can do 1% escrow here http://mentaso.com/escrow.html

Well, if you have any way of contacting him outside the forum, it would be helpful for him to know that there are a number of people with outstanding escrow to be released. I'm going to email him tonight.

Was this sorted out? He still hasn't been online...  ???

They sorted it but he disappeared again for over a month as of now, scary

So, john k is still missing, i think i found with his email address this facebook profile "John Koh"

so who is the go-to trusted escrow provider at the moment? i have need of one, figured John K would still be available when I needed him. all things change.

hope the fella is ok though.

~Green

You may try SebastianJu (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=18640). Group buy organizer and pleasant fellow. Also TAT (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?action=profile;u=79242) who has a fixed fee of 0.5 BTC, if this is still up-to-date.

I would follow the post John k made in the meta section as that is the post he will probably reply to when he returns.

I do free escrows