I found a paper wallet on a beach ... seriously

[easternklaas]

I know how this sounds,.. but I swear it's true... I saw and picked up what I thought was an odd looking piece of card in a dbl sealed plastic pocket whilst walking my dogs! The card inside was wet but legible and after drying it out I discovered it was a paper wallet (I have no idea about bitcoin or wallets aside from what I have discovered over last 24hrs,... which has led me here).
The paper wallet has 0.6 BTC. Some strange things have been known to wash up on this beach.  I suspect it was stolen and dumped by an ignorant burglar. It's there any way to identify from whom it came so I can return it? It seems pointless handing it into the police if they'll just destroy it....
I am in Victoria, Australia.
Thx

[Charles-Tim]

If you do not know the real owner, then you can not know the owner. The reason we should keep our private key or seed phrase safe in a safe location.

[easternklaas]

Law in Australia suggests I can be charged with 'theft by finding' if I don't make a reasonable attempt to identify the owner.  This seems to be impossible in this instance... seems a shame to hand it in to police.. who are likely not educated enough to know what to do with it.  What would you do?

[n0nce]

I know how this sounds,.. but I swear it's true... I saw and picked up what I thought was an odd looking piece of card in a dbl sealed plastic pocket whilst walking my dogs! The card inside was wet but legible and after drying it out I discovered it was a paper wallet (I have no idea about bitcoin or wallets aside from what I have discovered over last 24hrs,... which has led me here).
The paper wallet has 0.6 BTC. Some strange things have been known to wash up on this beach.  I suspect it was stolen and dumped by an ignorant burglar. It's there any way to identify from whom it came so I can return it? It seems pointless handing it into the police if they'll just destroy it....
I am in Victoria, Australia.
Thx

If you want to sell the Bitcoin without problems with exchanges, use a P2P decentralized exchange such as https://bisq.network/.
I don't think it is stolen since online criminals would just cash out the Bitcoin they stole and not run around with a paper seed of the coins.

But since there's no way to know who they belong to, keep them for yourself and / or sell them. Just be aware that centralized exchanges can easily freeze your account and you will have no way of proving origin of funds. However if you sell it little by little on Bisq, you will be golden.

[Since you are new here: I am not affiliated with Bisq. I could actually rent my avatar, but at the moment I choose to rather just promote services that I use and like, such as Bisq and WalletScrutiny - especially since they're not for-profit companies and as far as I know both are also looking for some donations or contributions from the community. So I'm giving them some exposure here.]

[easternklaas]

Excellent! Thanks for your advice.
Cheers

[suchmoon]

But since there's no way to know who they belong to, keep them for yourself and / or sell them.

This sounds horribly unethical. The coins don't belong to the OP. The original owner might have a backup and might try to move the funds once they notice that their paper wallet is missing.

[DaveF]

Working it a bit backwards. Since you have the address that the BTC went to, you can see then address / addresses the BTC came from.

Most major exchanges have known wallet addresses. If that address was funded from one of them you might be able to contact them and they can contact the person who the funds were sent to. It's a long shot but you never know.

NOT LEGAL ADVICE but according to Wikipedia:

In Victoria, the Victorian Crimes Act[9] defines this crime by exception "72.3(c) A person's appropriation of property belonging to another is not to be regarded as dishonest if he appropriates the property in the belief that the person to whom the property belongs cannot be discovered by taking reasonable steps.

If you can't trace the address and the police don't have a "paper wallet" listed as stolen or missing. Then it's probably yours. If you are worried you can always sit on the funds for a while before doing anything with them.

-Dave

[suchmoon]

NOT LEGAL ADVICE but according to Wikipedia:

In Victoria, the Victorian Crimes Act[9] defines this crime by exception "72.3(c) A person's appropriation of property belonging to another is not to be regarded as dishonest if he appropriates the property in the belief that the person to whom the property belongs cannot be discovered by taking reasonable steps.

If you can't trace the address and the police don't have a "paper wallet" listed as stolen or missing. Then it's probably yours. If you are worried you can always sit on the funds for a while before doing anything with them.

I don't think this applies if the owner did not actually lose the property (e.g. in this case they might have backups of the wallet so the OP found only one of multiple copies). The OP can't possibly know that so they shouldn't touch the coins.

Also this could fall under some unauthorized access/hacking law. The OP found a code to access someone's money, but they know they're not authorized to access it. It's like finding a key to someone's house. I don't think that gives the finder the right to take whatever is in the house.

[easternklaas]

Thx Dave and suchmoon. As nice as some extra money would be nice, it isn't mine and I'd rather it goes back to the owner . Best case scenario the owner does indeed have a copy. Naive question,.. but is it possible with this wallet to identify when it was last transacted upon?
Been back to the beach this morning and nothing else here to help me identify the owner.
Might just sit on it for a bit and seek more feedback. Thanks again. I am very appreciative of your time and advice.

[suchmoon]

Thx Dave and suchmoon. As nice as some extra money would be nice, it isn't mine and I'd rather it goes back to the owner . Best case scenario the owner does indeed have a copy. Naive question,.. but is it possible with this wallet to identify when it was last transacted upon?
Been back to the beach this morning and nothing else here to help me identify the owner.
Might just sit on it for a bit and seek more feedback. Thanks again. I am very appreciative of your time and advice.

Check the Bitcoin address via blockchain explorer, e.g.:

https://live.blockcypher.com/btc/

Put the address in the search box at the top and you should see the transaction history.

[DireWolfM14]

Thx Dave and suchmoon. As nice as some extra money would be nice, it isn't mine and I'd rather it goes back to the owner . Best case scenario the owner does indeed have a copy. Naive question,.. but is it possible with this wallet to identify when it was last transacted upon?
Been back to the beach this morning and nothing else here to help me identify the owner.
Might just sit on it for a bit and seek more feedback. Thanks again. I am very appreciative of your time and advice.

Check the Bitcoin address via blockchain explorer, e.g.:

https://live.blockcypher.com/btc/

Put the address in the search box at the top and you should see the transaction history.

Just to add to suchmoon's advice; he's talking about the public address, not private key.  Never share or post or upload that private key anywhere.  If you do, the coins will be compromised.

As for making a reasonable effort to find the rightful owner; as DaveF said, there are ways to trace the origin of the coins, or at least make the attempt.  If the coins originated from an exchange that records customer records they may be able to inform the owner that you have the private key.

If you need help with that there are members here who can assist.  I would suggest you stick around for a while, learn and figure out who you can trust to help.  Again; never share the private key with anyone, and it's probably best that you don't post the public address in public either.

[easternklaas]

Thank you

[Cricktor]

Never enter or expose the Private Key of the paper wallet publicly or online! You will likely get "interesting" private messages in this forum. Anyone who knows the Private Key can move the coins of the paper wallet.

The legitimate owner should be able to prove ownership by signing a Bitcoin message with the appropriate Private Key as long as (s)he has a copy of it. Otherwise you can't easily prove legit ownership. Some dudes might chime in and pretend it's theirs to claim the coins for themselves.

A paper wallet usually has a Private Key and a Public Address. To search for the owner you can try to find out via the transaction history of the paper wallet's Public Address. This requires some Blockchain analysis knowledge. But at places where there's KYC involved you won't get the owner's private details as usually this is disclosed only when official entities like police or jurisdiction is asking for it.

The least you can do as effort to find the owner in my opinion is to publish the Public Address only. The Private Key must stay offline, don't even take digital pictures of it with your smartphone or camera. Pay attention to use only safe QR code apps should there be QR code encoded data on this paper wallet.

If you're not familiar with Bitcoin what makes you think it's a Bitcoin paper wallet?

Bitcoin Private Key (all case-sensitive): starts with 5... for uncompressed key or K... or L... for compressed key, followed by a bunch of upper and lower case characters and numbers

Bitcoin Public Address: starts with 1..., 3... (both case-sensitive); bc1q... or (likely quite rare) bc1p... followed by a bunch of characters and numbers (bc1... are not case-sensitive and contain a "1" only in the prefix)

[pooya87]

The least you can do as effort to find the owner in my opinion is to publish the Public Address only.

This; but the problem is proving ownership. Anybody could claim they own the address and you'd have no way of knowing who is telling the truth. The only possible way is maybe if the real owner had the address that funded the paper wallet, which they could sign a message from that address. Other than that, I can't see any other solid proof.

[Cricktor]

Anybody could claim they own the address and you'd have no way of knowing who is telling the truth. The only possible way is maybe if the real owner had the address that funded the paper wallet, which they could sign a message from that address. Other than that, I can't see any other solid proof.

Anybody can claim as much as they like but can they prove it? IF the legit owner still has a copy of the Private Key of the paper wallet, only (s)he can verifiably prove ownership by signing a message with the particular Private Key of this paper wallet. I wrote that before already.

I have made Bitcoin paper wallets myself some years ago and still have a copy of the Private Keys in case the physical copy gets lost or destroyed. I see no point to destroy coins due to a lack of redundancy.

The owner of the Private Key of the address that funded the paper wallet, ie. the address from where coins were sent to the paper wallet address, must not necessarily be the owner of the paper wallet. She or he can be.

[pooya87]

IF the legit owner still has a copy of the Private Key of the paper wallet, (s)he can easily prove ownership by signing a message with the particular Private Key. I wrote that before already.

If they had the private key to that paper wallet they no longer need to prove ownership, they would just move the coins

The owner of the Private Key of the address that funded the paper wallet, ie. the address from where coins were sent to the paper wallet address, must not necessarily be the owner of the paper wallet. She or he can be.

That's right I didn't think of that, but at least there is a link that can be pursued to find the real owner.

[LoyceV]

Law in Australia suggests I can be charged with 'theft by finding' if I don't make a reasonable attempt to identify the owner.  This seems to be impossible in this instance...

You can start by posting the address here, so Google indexes it and the owner might respond here. Be prepared to get messages from people claiming to be the owner, so they'd need to provide evidence. And that's the tricky part: even a signed message from the address that funded the wallet doesn't necessarily mean it's the owner (it could be the guy who sold the Bitcoins to the current owner).
Another way to get the owners attention could be by leaving small hints by sending dust to the address and in the same transaction sending dust to for instance those 2 addresses:
1PaperWaLLetFound1xxxxxxxxy1KHknm
1Topic54o8263onBitcointaLkxyvdAVg (Note: I used Proof of Burn to create those addresses. DO NOT send anything valuable to those addresses, it will be lost forever).
The owner will have to know his address, but if he knows it and the wallet was indeed stolen, it's not unlikely they'll check a block explorer to see if the funds were moved. When they do, they'll see the new transaction with hints.

it's probably best that you don't post the public address in public either.

I'm in doubt: there's a privacy concern, but it's not easternklaas's privacy, and I don't think he can claim he made "a reasonable attempt" at finding the owner without publishing the address.

IF the legit owner still has a copy of the Private Key of the paper wallet, (s)he can easily prove ownership by signing a message with the particular Private Key.

IF they still have the private key, they should just move the funds the moment they realize a copy is missing.

[DireWolfM14]

it's probably best that you don't post the public address in public either.

I'm in doubt: there's a privacy concern, but it's not easternklaas's privacy, and I don't think he can claim he made "a resonable attempt" at finding the owner without publishing the address.

That's a good point.  If I were in easternklaas' shoes I would consider posting the address in public as a last resort.  I like the idea of sending dust to the address and a "clue" address in one transaction, that's pretty darn clever.  With a tactic like that you may not have to post the public address, but if you've made the clue address known someone could figure it out.

[Cricktor]

And that's the tricky part: even a signed message from the address that funded the wallet doesn't necessarily mean it's the ownerr (it could be the guy who sold the Bitcoins to the current owner).

If you buy or get a paper wallet from someone you can't 100% trust for the lifetime of the paper wallet, you should move the coins off the paper wallet and create your own one as destination if you want to keep a paper wallet.

Another way to get the owners attention could be by leaving small hints by sending dust to the address and in the same transaction sending dust to for instance those 2 addresses:
1PaperWaLLetFound1xxxxxxxxy1KHknm
1Topic54o8263onBitcointaLkxyvdAVg (Note: I used Proof of Burn to create those addresses. DO NOT send anything valuable to those addresses, it will be lost forever).
The owner will have to know his address, but if he knows it and the wallet was indeed stolen, it's not unlikely they'll check a block explorer to see if the funds were moved. When they do, they'll see the new transaction with hints.

While easier to spot with such "burn addresses" unfortunately this bloats the UTXO set.
An OP_RETURN "Found lost or stolen paper wallet, see thread on bitcointalk.org" as transaction output at the proper place speaks for itself, but frankly isn't for newbies. Sorry, I don't want to derail this thread.

IF they still have the private key, they should just move the funds the moment they realize a copy is missing.

That should happen likely but would leave @easternklaas as apparently honest finder with empty pockets unless the legit owner shows some gratitude to the honest finder.

Hm, the privacy concerns sound strange to me (yes, I care about privacy) but the likely loss of a substantial amount of coins weights more in my opinion. The person you was reckless enough to loose the paper wallet shouldn't complain about his privacy, I guess.

[Lucius]

I agree with everyone who suggests that you should publicly post the address containing 0.6 BTC and thus not only try to attract the attention of the real owner, but also at least partially confirm your story.

@easternklaas, When I read your location, it occurred to me that a few months ago I read about floods in that part of Australia, so I wonder if it is possible that some of the floods actually caused that paper wallet to appear on the beach? I think that the flood hit some houses and thus took some things with it into the river that flows into the sea, which then threw that wallet onto the beach.

It's just a theory, of course, but somehow it seems more realistic to me than someone walking on the beach with a paper wallet containing 0.6 BTC, losing it and not trying to find it.