What would you do if you found others' keys?

[Cantsay]

What would you do if you managed to come across someone else's private key and it's worth an amount that most people would 'prefer not to lose', assuming you have no [idea who it belongs] to or [location clues]? Eg. Sweeping through common books' text for BIP39-based keys.

I suppose you could send a dollar's worth to a different address and hopefully they'd get the hint.

If you check almost all the replies you'll see everyone saying one of the following; that there'll find a way to return back to the own, that they will send the money to charitable donations, that they will look for ways to use the money to help others etcetera etcetera etcetera.
But the truth is that majority of those writing those stuff there don't really have those things in mind, but still wrote them so that others won't look at them as people that are greedy or so. I know that there are alot of users that are really going to abide by what they replied I'm this thread.

As for me I won't be certain if I'm going to return it. Me returning the key will be determined by some certain factors like;

• where was the key found, the place where the wallet key was found is going to affect my decision if I'm going to return the key or not.
• The amount that the wallet holds, if the money isn't that significant I definitely would return it. But if the funds is huge greed might come in play and it will become more difficult to return it back to the owner.
• there other factors like ; if I'll have any guilty conscience when I refuse to return it, if the owner eventually starts looking for the wallet key

The list goes on... All these are things that are going to affect my decision on whether to return it or give it to charitable donations.
It's best to be true to oneself and receive advice that will help you change for a better person than to live in lies. This is me been true to myself.

[LDL]

Actually no one ever falls into such a situation, but even if one ever falls into such a situation I have never seen private key/wallet backup key returned to the original owner.  But if I ever find myself in such a situation I will take whatever measures I should to return it to the original owner.
If I accidentally get the backup key of a wallet, I will headline the news paper with the address of the wallet and wait until the original owner gets the wallet back.  Also if that doesn't work then I will broadcast news with wallet address on radio and television.  So that the owner can see or read this news.  If that doesn't work then I'll be constantly posting news on my youtube and tiktok channels.
Finally if that doesn't work then I will hand over the said wallet to the government police force.  Believe it or not I will never use the cryptocurrency or assets of said wallet for my own use.

[laurenB7742]

Almost every reply shows how good and honest the fellow members are but come to the reality, I don't think we are going to take an effort and find out the real owner but actually its impossible to find who is the actual owner and technically who own the key becomes the owner of the wallet so its yours and completely you decide what to do with it, I would say if there is enough money to buy a Lambo then I would. LoL

We all have greed, and I really don't believe people are telling the truth here. Since this is just an assumption, we will say we will return it or ignore it as it is not our property or will use it for charity...but when we pick up such a large amount of money, and no one knows about it, I'm sure our greed will prevent us from doing good. Human greed is still the scariest thing in the world, so I really don't believe what people are saying here.

[Hispo]

I would keep the private key and do not move any money out of it for some time, to see what happens if nothing happens then I would try to investigate the history of some of the addresses linked to the private key.

Some transactions are easy to distinguish when come to exchanges or go to exchanges, if I found one of those transactions and manage to identify the exchange there is a enough good chance I could convince the technical support of the exchange to send a mail or notification to the user about his seed being completely compromised.

[digaran]

Funny you should ask this question in a place full of thieves and cheaters, no one will admit publicly that they will steal the money which doesn't belong to them.

First of all if I find a large amount, I will transfer to my address and sign a message with the old address then
Post the signed message on forums, social medias, the owner will contact me then, and why should I do that? Because someone else could also find, take and run with them.

[xSkylarx]

Most of us will for sure say we will try to track down the owner and try to return it, but the reality is that it is difficult and for sure you will keep it or transfer it immediately. Still, I belong to the lowest percentage of people who are honest. This happened to me earlier this year, around December, when I received an amount that was sort of large in our local online wallet with our own fiat. Someone mistakenly sent me an amount, which fortunately is easy to track, so I was able to return it. It is not good to own money you don't have. If you found it, you should leave it there and wait for the owner to discover it. Don't touch it.

[Rruchi man]

What would you do if you managed to come across someone else's private key and it's worth an amount that most people would 'prefer not to lose', assuming you have no [idea who it belongs] to or [location clues]? Eg. Sweeping through common books' text for BIP39-based keys.

The place you found the private key matters and can give an idea of who may have it and what to do with it. If it was found on a road like a lonely street, trying to find the identity of the owner will be much more difficult than when you found it in someone's house or private space. If you found it in someone's house and you still even went ahead to check the balance, that's criminal to me, but if you somehow found it on a lonely street, on a public bus, in the park or any public place where it can belong to just any individual, it will not be a crime to know what the seed phrase is worth, not to take it but to be conscious. The owner of the seed phrase will most likely know that they have lost their seed phrase and make efforts to try to get to where they kept the back-up to move their money away, so your duty is just to keep the seed phrase and give the owner some time to move his money out.
 
Note: By keeping it, you have prevented the seed phrase from getting into the hands of people who do not have good intentions and may just want to withdraw everything to another place before the owner can do so.

In the case where it seems like it is something that the owner has completely lost, it is just too sad, but giving it to charity becomes the next best option.

[lenexn]

I think if you lose the key, it's very difficult to find the original owner, and you don't know which one is the real owner, which is really embarrassing.

[zfhrt80]

I think most people are attracted to money. If it was a lot of money, I think I would be tempted to probably accept it to improve my life. . .

[Reid]

I'd give it back without a doubt, but I will make sure the real owner will be the one who will receive it. Don't want to fall to the hands of those who are dumb enough to think they won't be traced if they try to pass it to a new address and then another.
Even if you pass it to an exchange, it can still be traced. What's worst is that if whoever tries to steal it did a KYC.
That's the good thing about cryptocurrencies unlike when you drop your wallet in the street.

[alire zaham]

I would send this amount to some charitable foundation for sick children or children without parents. It's not my fault that the keys that someone lost were found by another person. I doubt the real owner can be found. Too many people will show up. Accordingly, it is considered easy money or someone's alms. Therefore, alms should be given to those in need. If you leave yourself such amounts, you can expect trouble. In my opinion, it was a fair decision.

The key question is that if I have the 12 mnemonic words of the wallet, I don't know who the owner is? So no matter how you deal with the assets in the wallet, it is reasonable. If there are a lot of digital assets in the wallet, I may choose to repair the roads in our community first, because there are many elderly people, and it will be very inconvenient when it rains. The rest of the money I will choose to improve my quality of life.

[CODE200]

I'd give it back without a doubt, but I will make sure the real owner will be the one who will receive it. Don't want to fall to the hands of those who are dumb enough to think they won't be traced if they try to pass it to a new address and then another.
Even if you pass it to an exchange, it can still be traced. What's worst is that if whoever tries to steal it did a KYC.
That's the good thing about cryptocurrencies unlike when you drop your wallet in the street.

Acutally. I would also do the same thing in a sense that I will find the true owner of it. But imagine, these 12 words that we called seed phrase are hard to identify and hard to knew who is the owner. In a sense of having no idea or random found of the key. I might be sure to enter it in a exact wallet and applicable in order to use the funds and then I will eventually use the money that will somehow makes more meaningful. Hypothetically, these are the things that I might do.

Yet. In cryptowallets, a person who had a good knowledge or security to its wallet, will never ever just save a one copy of his seed key yet he will also have it in his computer logged in and also digital save. I think the main idea or the scenario of this question is that how will you react or what will you do if you found a seed phrase to a digital wallet? Either you will access it faster or none.

[TalkativeCoin]

I would probably try to backtrack it if I can relate the address to some of the exchanges (if there was any traffic between some and the wallet) and maybe contact them to get info on the owner, but I think that's a long shot.

[coinerer]

If I find someone's private key and if there is a lot of money in it, then since it is not possible to trace the owner through this private key, I will distribute the funds in this wallet to poor people and donate to some organizations where orphans live. I don't know how honest I can be then because the greed of money tries to drag everyone down the wrong path.  But I will not use them in my own work until I have good knowledge

[ilovealtcoins]

What would you do if you managed to come across someone else's private key and it's worth an amount that most people would 'prefer not to lose', assuming you have no [idea who it belongs] to or [location clues]? Eg. Sweeping through common books' text for BIP39-based keys.

I suppose you could send a dollar's worth to a different address and hopefully they'd get the hint.

If you check almost all the replies you'll see everyone saying one of the following; that there'll find a way to return back to the own, that they will send the money to charitable donations, that they will look for ways to use the money to help others etcetera etcetera etcetera.
But the truth is that majority of those writing those stuff there don't really have those things in mind, but still wrote them so that others won't look at them as people that are greedy or so. I know that there are alot of users that are really going to abide by what they replied I'm this thread.

As for me I won't be certain if I'm going to return it. Me returning the key will be determined by some certain factors like;

• where was the key found, the place where the wallet key was found is going to affect my decision if I'm going to return the key or not.
• The amount that the wallet holds, if the money isn't that significant I definitely would return it. But if the funds is huge greed might come in play and it will become more difficult to return it back to the owner.
• there other factors like ; if I'll have any guilty conscience when I refuse to return it, if the owner eventually starts looking for the wallet key

The list goes on... All these are things that are going to affect my decision on whether to return it or give it to charitable donations.
It's best to be true to oneself and receive advice that will help you change for a better person than to live in lies. This is me been true to myself.

It's all blatant lies, I'm sure everyone who claims to give back those bitcoins will never try to give them back but they'll find some way to quickly transfer those bitcoins to their wallet. We all crave bitcoins, we accumulate satoshi every single so no one will be kind enough to return bitcoins if found. Through OP's story, you can see a lot of shameless and self-righteous liars.

[Iranus]

To be honest, I've never thought about this issue, so it's a bit difficult to answer the question, I'm not lying or being as noble as many people here. But suppose I found someone else's keys, my greed would surface, and I would definitely open them up immediately. If its value is so little and insignificant, I certainly won't need it because I'm not too poor to have to steal. But if it's a large amount of bitcoin worth millions of dollars, I don't think I'm in a hurry to return it to that person, but maybe I will take it because I think then greed will overwhelm reason.

[panganib999]

Though the chances of it happening for me is slim to none, I think of keeping the wallet's contents if I ever do stumble to one unattended address with its keys out in the open. Chances are, nobody knows who the owner is and I'd only doubt anyone who would come forward to claim its theirs because of little to no evidence that would suggest they are. So as much as it may seem immoral to other people, it's best to just keep the wallet and its contents, but not touch it as much as possible because some scammers leave and even give their wallet and its details to take advantage of people.

[Falconer]

Actually no one ever falls into such a situation, but even if one ever falls into such a situation I have never seen private key/wallet backup key returned to the original owner.  But if I ever find myself in such a situation I will take whatever measures I should to return it to the original owner.

Without a doubt, I can truly say you have a good personality.
Even in this modern age someone who is honest is really hard to find especially when it comes to money. But I think you can say anything at this point, but you won't necessarily be able to resist any temptations and urges if you're in that situation. 

OP, it's hard to expect someone to return those bitcoin to an owner he or she never knew about, in fact I'm pretty sure someone would run away if they got 1 or more bitcoin accidentally sent for them. But if it's me, it just depends on how much balance there is. If it's only 0.00001 then I think I'm more likely not to get it. Lol

[Bushdark]

I am too excited to see this post and people's opinions about what they would do if they eventually see it. I am happy that almost everyone here sounds like a true saint that would be ready to return the BTC even though it worth upto 10 BTC. In this case I don't think many of us would ever return it even though it worth just $100. From everyone perspectives I can see that words are easier said than done.

It would really depend,
What if the private key has already been leaked or posted online?
 

This would be more on like a giveaway for the fastest finger. I don't think finding a private keys online would have so much $ in it even though it's a giveaway. Could that be possibility for this? No, maybe on a rare basis.

I once saw someone just dropping private key to give out some crypto.

Wow, did you tried to check whether there was a sort of Bitcoin in it?
 You might not be lucky to be the first to check it.

 

But suppose I found someone else's keys, my greed would surface, and I would definitely open them up immediately. If its value is so little and insignificant, I certainly won't need it because I'm not too poor to have to steal. But if it's a large amount of bitcoin worth millions of dollars, I don't think I'm in a hurry to return it to that person, but maybe I will take it because I think then greed will overwhelm reason.

You just explode my thought and it's good for you being sincere to yourself just like other people that are not money conscious would also react since there problem is not about taking what does not belong to them.
We are all humans and the flesh cam tempt us even though we don't have the interest to go with what does not belong to us.

If I find someone's private key and if there is a lot of money in it, then since it is not possible to trace the owner through this private key, I will distribute the funds in this wallet to poor people and donate to some organizations where orphans live.

Maybe I might be lucky to get some funds from you since you would want to be send part of it to the poor and needy.

I don't know how honest I can be then because the greed of money tries to drag everyone down the wrong path.  But I will not use them in my own work until I have good knowledge

Since everyone one has some level of greed then we might be mislead by our thought to go away with the BTC but our consciousness cam drag us to give part of it out since we can not always find the owner.

[Sharonchy]

No amount is too small to lose, but sincerely speaking I will settle myself first because I obviously need the money, my promise to the owner I won't take all, 90% of the money is okay for me