Do you believe stolen funds should be returned to their owner?

[akeegan]

Over $4 billion has been stolen or laundered in the first six months of 2019! This interview with CipherTrace CEO Dave Jevans is really interesting regarding details of the lost and stolen funds.

I was surprised to see that ransomware and scams are some of the biggest points of money loss over exchange hacks.

Worth while interview to watch and join in the conversation of what should happen to stolen funds. Do you get them returned  or in a decentralized system are they lost forever?

https://blocktv.com/watch/2019-08-22/5d5ea9e847c19-scams-hacks-ransomware-run-amok-in-the-cryptosphere

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[asajapheth]

Base on simple morality, I'd agree that stolen funds should be returned to the owners. With the rate of thefts in the cryptosphere, security agencies would be interested in tracking these funds. Many crypto users do not like the idea of regulation - I don't too, but this is one of the problems regulation tend solve. We don't have to be nonchalant since we haven't lost any funds to these thefts.

[Hypnosis00]

Base on simple morality, I'd agree that stolen funds should be returned to the owners. With the rate of thefts in the cryptosphere, security agencies would be interested in tracking these funds. Many crypto users do not like the idea of regulation - I don't too, but this is one of the problems regulation tend solve. We don't have to be nonchalant since we haven't lost any funds to these thefts.

I never think such morality exist by now. They steal our funds in a certain purposes and not by returning it over. We can't expect that we can have it back once it lost, nobody could do that.
In a particular reason why they stole our funds just because we let them to get it. How it sad, we can't get them cause of the anonymity we had in this community. We can only trace the transactions but not the person who make it.

[mu_enrico]

The topic is different from what you have posted.

Yep, I agree with this. In the real world, stolen funds will be returned by the authorities. However, that was possible because the police could recover funds.

This becomes somewhat complicated with cryptocurrency because there is a possibility that the private key cannot be obtained. However, if waterboarding can recover the hacker's key, then they must return it.

[crwth]

Imagine being the person who got their money stolen. Wouldn't you want to get it back?

I don't expect it to be easy but if the hackers are caught and the money that they got from all the scamming that they are doing is recovered, wouldn't it be right to return them? Knowing cryptocurrencies and its irreversible transactions but it still could be tracked. Maybe from the owners themselves can sign a message saying that this is your wallet and got stolen. From that wallet, you could now follow the trail of the BTC. Proving the ownership, I guess.

[Saltius]

Of course yes!
But I also believe that the correct method should be like this: find out who the thief is, then use $5 wrenches to beat him until he returns the funds.

Then who should be responsible for carrying out those operations mentioned above?

My answer is the one who is responsible for the funds which means if you keep the funds in your own wallet then it is youreslf, else if you keep the funds in exchanges, then it should be the exchanges.

[yazher]

If possible stolen funds must be returned to their respective owners if they can still track its owners. Because these funds are earned by them it the hard way some people bought Crypto Currencies with all they have.

It is not a good idea to keep it to ourselves if we are some sort of authority because we know how hard to earn some cash these days. that's why if it's possible to return the stolen unds then return it.

[mk4]

I never think such morality exist by now. They steal our funds in a certain purposes and not by returning it over.

I mean, I'm not defending thieves(fuck them), but it would be really unrealistic to expect thieves to return stolen money.

If possible stolen funds must be returned to their respective owners if they can still track its owners.

We can track every transaction in the bitcoin blockchain simply because it's transparent. While we can trace the coins being moved, it still doesn't guarantee for us to know the thief in the end; unless the thief does some really stupid stuff like sending the money on a custodial exchange with his/her name affiliated with the address, which is something that we honestly shouldn't expect them to be making.

[pooya87]

Over $4 billion has been stolen or laundered in the first six months of 2019! This interview with CipherTrace CEO Dave Jevans is really interesting regarding details of the lost and stolen funds.

don't believe the stats that these companies that are doing "blockchain analysis" release. they exaggerate things and most of the times they release fake numbers that don't even make sense.

Do you get them returned  or in a decentralized system are they lost forever?

can you really prove they were "stolen"?
lets say a transaction goes out of your wallet spending all your funds. can you prove that it was a hacker that stole it or was it you who sold those coins and now want to scam the other party by calling it a hack?
you see the problem here?

[Darker45]

This appears to me a simple case of logic and propriety. If a fund is stolen, it should be reported to the proper authorities. The authorities will have to investigate and employ all necessary legal measures to recover the funds. If the funds are recovered, it will be returned to whoever owns it. If the robbers are not caught and brought to justice, then it would be very hard to recover what was stolen unless the funds goes under the radar of the authorities and is tracked down. It will then be frozen with the cooperation of the site in which it is stored, and eventually returned to where they came from. 

It does not mean that any stolen fund in a decentralized environment is lost forever. There were already cases of crypto robberies in the past where funds are successfully recovered. 

[Kakmakr]

Ok, let's take this scenario :

Scammer steals 10 bitcoins from his mark and he immediately spends those bitcoins at a local online computer shop. The computer shop does not know where the bitcoins are coming from, but the coins can be traced back to their shop. The goods was picked up by the scammer, but the scammer used a fake ID to take the receipt of the goods and no copies was made of the ID documents, so the scammer cannot be traced.

Should the computer shop pay back the 10 bitcoins that was legally received for goods that was purchased at their shop? This is not as straight forward as it sounds, because a lot of scammer mix those coins or they buy online goods to launder that money.  

[Anonylz]

If there is anyway to get your stolen funds back then why not! Ofcours it is the proper thing to do, if funds where repprted stolen and the authorities are able to recover the funds, it would be only logically to return it to the owner's by following due process, but on a more serious note, is it really possible to get stolen crypto back? because i feel in most cases those funds are lost forever.

[timerland]

The article is very different to what your title states, and your discussing 2 different things.

Regarding if funds should be returned to their owner, yes, of course. That was your money that was stolen, and you deserve it back, not in the hands of the government, or the hacker/thief. Is this viable though is the real question, and that is a definite no. Think of the number of resources that would be required to do such a thing, and it's near impossible to get funds returned correctly, and the government would never do such a thing if they caught the thieves.

Another big issue, how would you prove that funds were stolen? A transaction going out of your wallet isn't really enough, and BTC offers way less information compared to fiat money, so it'll be much harder to prove such things.

I never think such morality exist by now. They steal our funds in a certain purposes and not by returning it over.

I mean, I'm not defending thieves(fuck them), but it would be really unrealistic to expect thieves to return stolen money.

I think we are assuming that the thieves are caught, and the government or another entity holds the funds.

[maxreish]

Do you get them returned  or in a decentralized system are they lost forever?

In an actual scenario, hacked funds do not usually returned to the owner. Hackers do their illegal job to get funds from a particular exchanges to sustain their financial needs. I do not think that they will reconsider their morality hence, they would ignore it and will not waste another time to returned what they've got.

But on the other side, yeah they should. It is because, user's did not easily get the money they have invested, they worked hard for it. If that would be the reason for the hacked victims to messed up their life, i do hope hackers will atleast return it.

[Coyster]

If you're making an open request for scammers of thieves to return funds they stole, then that is never going to happen, why did they steal the funds in the first place if they are simply going to return it, it's almost impossible to appeal to the conscience of criminals.

But in case of recovered funds which happens less frequently in this cryptocurrency environment, then the funds ought to be returned to the original owners, but when you take another look at it, how many stolen funds have been recovered, it's near zero, the technology makes it difficult for us to track down criminals.

[davis196]

OP,you are formulating your question in the wrong way.
I guess that you are asking about whether or not crypto transactions should become reversible,in order to fight all the scammers,hackers and cheaters.Is that what you are trying to ask?
I don't think that making transactions reversible will solve the problem.Look at the fiat banking industry.Billions of dollars stolen every year,and yet they can't reverse those fiat transactions.

[Janation]

Stolen and being lost forever is different from each other.

When your cryptocurrencies are stolen, obviously there is a way to return that the thing is that it is close to impossible to do that unless you know who done that. When you send your Bitcoin into a wrong address and hat address don't exist, the Bitcoin you sent will not be found or returned since that is already lost forever and that is deducted to the total supply, it can't be used anymore. For me, I hope that it will be returned to the owner since ethically speaking, that is the right thing to do.

[sheenshane]

It's simple logic if the hacker has been caught and the fund stolen was also recovered then it might return to the owner. Yeah, I know that crypto transactions are not irreversible but there is a high chance that it will trace/tract and become hacker caught. It would be returned by the authorities to the official owner.

That case if hackers been caught it will be returned, but if not it will be lost forever even you know where is the last drop address on it. (Majority of stolen bitcoin are  not being recovered, so we don't expect it will return to the owner).

[Duzter]

In a decentralized platform something lost is lost forever. It'll get refunded only if the user who stole the funds need to have the mind to refund it back. In one case that happened in my country, there is a borrowing of certain amount of USD in bitcoin, and while returning back the borrower returned in terms of bitcoin as the market of bitcoin was down. This was taken to the custody of the police and a complaint has been filed. No result on the complaint yet. This way refund is completely an impossible thing.

[xvids]

Depending on whether the person who receives Bitcoin is good or not, if they are good they will return it, but often all things are not returned, so sad 

It doesn't matter if their good or bad the thing is,
Stolen money should be given back to it's rightful owner,
They worked for they earned it so they should be the one to spend it.