[2016-04-27] Motherboard: Someone Tried to Pay $5 in Bitcoin, Sent $137K Instead

[pawel7777]

Someone Tried to Pay $5 in Bitcoin, Sent $137K Instead

http://motherboard.vice.com/en_ca/read/someone-tried-to-pay-5-in-bitcoin-sent-137k-instead

There are bad days, and then there are days when you accidentally send $137,000 worth of bitcoin to somebody with no way to retrieve it.

This is apparently what happened to some unlucky person on Tuesday. A Twitter user spotted that somebody sent a bitcoin transaction amounting to roughly $5, but with a fee of 291.241 bitcoins, or $137,081.31, attached. This massive fee didn’t go to the intended recipient—they only got the fiver—but instead went to the person in the bitcoin network who processed the transaction.

According to the Twitter user, whomever sent this transaction likely meant to send the $137,000 to someone they knew, and just wanted to attach a $5 fee as a thank-you to the payment processor, but got it mixed up. Instead, they sent their pal enough change for a Starbucks coffee, and a bitcoin company enough cash to buy a new Maserati.
...

Author could do a better research. No idea where did he get the '$5' from. Recipient received BTC0.0001 which translates to less than 5 cents not $5.
https://blockchain.info/tx/cc455ae816e6cdafdb58d54e35d4f46d860047458eacf1c7405dc634631c570d

[tiggytomb]

Ouch! with an amount like that you need to be checking, checking and checking one more time everything is correct before sending.  Do we think whoever found the block will raise their hand and give it back?  that is one hell of a decision for that person.

Edit
I see in your other post that they have come forward, still some good people in the world https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1452678.0;topicseen