Is it possible to find lost bitcoins?

[frankbitcoin]

those bitcoin are like gift for everyone, they decrease the inflation and permits bitcoin to worth more, it is rather a good new that many bitcoin got burnt for the bitocin holders, would be nice to know how many but we will never know, its certainly much more than we all believe

Yep, and with over 1 Million bitcoins hacked from Mt Gox and Bitfinex, that's about 5% of the coins right there.   Then who's to say how many have been lost over the years from people who misplaced their keys...probably at least another 1 million coins.  The 21 Mil coin availability is probably more like 15 million between the hacks, lost coins, and burnt coins.

[Fria]

Blockchain experts states that coins cannot be used if wallets digital or hardware is lost and this is one of the reasons why there are so many investors are investing Bitcoin and Altcoins because of it's security feature.
There are more or less 2 million coins were lost in the wild so the fewer coins circulated the higher value of a coin.

[Chasoid]

In a single case, I would say that you can find lost bitcoins. Some people even buy old wallets to solve the password to get the bitcoins that lie in this purse. But not every password can be brootforced and in a global sense, it will be too difficult to do.

[Agamemnus]

It is possible you can find your lost bitcoins if you are able to contact the miners that hashed that algorithm. You'll need to use a block explorer to search through your txn history though.

[Bolt Brownie]

I know it's impossible to find lost bitcoins. If one loses access to his address and does not have the private key then those bitcoins will be out of circulation for good. But after reading this topic, I got another question. Wouldn't be important to know how many bitcoins were lost?

No one could know for sure, but maybe they could have an estimate about it. Like if coins are stuck in an address for lots of years, and probably those addresses are associated with wallets that are no longer operational (like multibit classic, etc), wouldn't that mean that those coins are potencial lost?

I don't even know if you can try to associate an address to a wallet, but you can probably check for coins that haven't been moved in a long time.
The thing is, that since BTC is limited, being able to estimate how much BTC were lost, could have an impact on it's price.

[Ayush rana]

No it is not possible to find lost bitcoins because all the transactions of crypto currencies are non tracable. Which means they cannot be track by us.

[Wicked17]

Millions of bitcoins are considered lost. Who will find them?

No one, this is how digital coins money works. Once they lost the bitcoin and the private key you cannot find it anymore because we cannot trace it even the computer cannot bruteforce it. Its like finding a small coin in a deep sea level. I was wondering if the missing bitcoin in the circulation also affect the value of the coin

[EpicFail]

In a single case, I would say that you can find lost bitcoins. Some people even buy old wallets to solve the password to get the bitcoins that lie in this purse. But not every password can be brootforced and in a global sense, it will be too difficult to do.

What is this brootforcing that you speak of? Please explain.

[senin]

The lost bitcoins, that is, bitcoins, to which access for various reasons have been lost, remain encrypted in the block-chain block-chain. They can be extracted from there only by cheating them. Yes, it is very difficult, but not impossible. Let's say that now it is rather difficult or even almost impossible, since decryption provides an incredible number of options. However, given the increasing cost of bitcoin and the constant development of technical progress, in the future, I think this will be possible, especially with the support of the technology itself.

[aisyah88]

it is not possible if the missing bitcoin will be rediscovered because anyone who finds the bitcoin will return it to the person who lost it ... little talk. I've lost it until now it's back my bitcoin ...

[SupportBitcoin]

Unfortunately, once they are lost they are gone forever
 The only way to retrieve is the private key and if that is not known, just drops them from circulation. As another poster said, the supply and demand will just make our Bitcoins more valuable. So at least there is some good news!

[ObscurePen]

No one. If you lose your private keys, you cannot access your Bitcoin. This is good in one way. It gives your Bitcoin more security. So if you have all your private keys, you have control of all your Bitcoin. It is not like banks. However, in another sense, for example this scenario, it is not favourable. If you have your bitcoin stored in a ledger wallet or a USB and you lose it or break it, all your Bitcoin is lost. This is why everyone suggests that you back up your Bitcoin. Write down your private key and store it somewhere. Store your Bitcoin in multiple wallets. These are some ways that you can use to prevent you losing your Bitcoin.

[frowsiter]

those bitcoin are like gift for everyone, they decrease the inflation and permits bitcoin to worth more, it is rather a good new that many bitcoin got burnt for the bitocin holders, would be nice to know how many but we will never know, its certainly much more than we all believe

Yep, and with over 1 Million bitcoins hacked from Mt Gox and Bitfinex, that's about 5% of the coins right there.   Then who's to say how many have been lost over the years from people who misplaced their keys...probably at least another 1 million coins.  The 21 Mil coin availability is probably more like 15 million between the hacks, lost coins, and burnt coins.

I don't think we even have 15 mil coins in circulation at this point. There are pretty much less than that. Because hey you forgot that MR. Satoshi holds more than 6% of coins in his possession too. Lolz. SO that is why the prices are rising here and we are running out of the supply. The demand well it will never stop increasing and hence it will create amphora of investors leading to more demand. We might just hit 15K rates next month or even further if investors kept everything on the serious ends


Im fully confident that the supply is now so much less the rates will boost up a lot. The whales must be knowing this and they might invest more than millions in single shot.

[rasho321]

When a user loses his wallet, it has the effect of
removing money out of circulation. Lost bitcoins still
remain in the block chain just like any other bitcoins.
However, lost bitcoins remain dormant forever because
there is no way for anybody to find the private key/keys
that would allow them to be spent again. Because of the
law of supply and demand, when fewer bitcoins are
available, the ones that are left will be in higher demand
and increase in value to compensate.

[Snub]

I have rcently heart about a British guy who throwed out hard drie with BTC7.5k on it.
you can find that drive and you will find bitcoins:)

[QuartzMen]

if your lost bitcoin its means that address bitcoin without private key i think yes, that bitcoin wouldn't saved until the owner of thaat address take that bitcoin with the private key that match with that address

[dawoodkhan97]

Unless you don't know the private key to your
wallet, it is not possible to recover lost bitcoins.

So all those bitcoins are probably lost and cannot
be utilized.

[shritin1707]

It depends on the thief. And there is a big range of behavior. For quite a few, it's actually pretty easy to track the stolen bitcoins in the blockchain. Tools like ours (BlockSeer) help make it easier. However, thieves do have something going for them - they can just claim it was someone else! Each time the thief sends all the bitcoin to a new bitcoin address, they can claim that the ownership has changed, and it is really someone else who is the thief.

[AdamRay]

I think it is impossible. bitcoin can not be lost. and they are only dug out, or moved from one wallet address to another. and if no password. You can not access the address of the thief

[beverly788113]

 bitcoin can not be lost. And they are only dug out, or moved from one address to another. I think if we had a password to enter the address of the thief. We will definitely find the lost bitcoin number