New 400 BTC Bounty Pales Roger Ver's 37.6 BTC Bounty for Return of Stolen BTC

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Back story on how Roger Ver did it: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2642600/Are-going-order-hitman-kill-Digital-currency-millionaire-known-The-Bitcoin-Jesus-turns-tables-blackmailer-placing-20-000-online-bounty-head.html

'Are you going to order a hitman to kill me now?' Digital millionaire 'Bitcoin Jesus' turns tables on blackmailer by placing $20,000 online 'bounty' on his head

- Hacker 'Nitrous' had seized control of email account belonging to Roger Ver
- He threatened to sell-on his personal information unless ransom was paid
- But Ver offered reward on Facebook offering same sum for Nitrous's capture
- Terrified Nitrous quickly backed down offering cowering apology
- Mr Ver is believed to have amassed a small fortune through Bitcoin currency
- It is linked to the SilkRoad marketplace where hitmen are offered for sale

By DANIEL MILLER

PUBLISHED: 04:05 EST, 29 May 2014 | UPDATED: 08:35 EST, 29 May 2014

A millionaire businessman known as 'The Bitcoin Jesus' turned the tables on a hacker who was attempting to blackmail him by offering $20,000 worth of the digital currency as a reward for his capture.

U.S. born Roger Ver has amassed a small fortune in Bitcoins after investing heavily from 2011 and using the currency, which has since exploded in value, to back a number of start-up firms.

But last week he received a threatening message from a hacker known as Nitrous who had taken control of an old Hotmail account using it to steal personal information including Mr Ver's social security and passport numbers.

Nitrous then threatened to sell the information to fraudsters unless Mr Ver paid him 37 bitcoins - worth a cool $20,000, Wired magazine reports.

Although Mr Ver is believed to be easily be able to afford such a sum, he refused to pay up and instead used Facebook to offer the same amount as a reward for information that would lead to Nitrous's arrest.

While Bitcoin is often trumpeted as simply being a libertarian currency and way to move money across international boundaries it is heavily linked to the sinister online marketplace SilkRoad where drugs, guns and even hitmen are offered for sale.

Soon after the bounty was placed on Facebook a clearly terrifed Nitrous backed down contacting Mr Ver with a cowering apology.

He wrote: 'Sir, I am sincerely sorry. I am just a middleman. I was being told what to tell you.
'Are you going to order a hitman to kill me now?'


Response: Mr Ver posted this message on Facebook after which the hacker quickly backed down

It was a far cry from the blackmailer's original messages in which he brazenly threatened to exploit Mr Ver after seizing control of the old email account which Mr Ver had used several years ago to register the internet domain memorydealers.com for his computer parts business.

After taking over the account Nitrous was not only able to access Mr Ver's personal information but also that of his mother which he threatened to sell to 'fraudsters' who would 'ruin both of your lives'.

'I think we both know this won’t be pleasent [sic] and let’s be honest: there is nothing you can do to have me caught. I’ve been around too long,' Nitrous wrote, before adding: 'I have to say: I respect you as a BTC user/icon.

'Let's be honest I will sell your information to fraudsters that will credit f*** you then get your moms social and credit f*** her too and ruin both your lives.'

'37.6 BTC isn't worth s*** to you, the damage I cause to you financially/family-wise will be way worse than that.'

Mr Ver, who is now based in Japan, decided to stall for time, attempting to negotiate with Nitous, while he and close associate Jason Maurice, chief hacking officer of Japanese security startup Wiz Technologies, attempted to wrestle back control of the hacked accounts.

After an hour-long exchange through Skype, Nitous attempted to up the ante, threatening to 'own' Ver 10,0000 times harder.

'You Fag,' he wrote. 'Listen, my mom needs a liver transplant that starts at $15,000, man…I am so sorry for having to do this, but it’s just what I have to do.'

But Ver cooly responded by posting a link to the Facebook post offering the reward and Nitrous quickly backed down.

He then wrote: 'Sir, I am sincerely sorry I am just a middleman I was being told what to tell you.

'I was seriously being told what to tell you by someone else I don't even know what's going on.

'Please stop I am so sorry I told him that you are now going to have me killed over something he made me do I didn't even do this it was someone else.'

Mr Ver said he has not been contacted by the hacker since.

In the spirit of the above, Brock Pierce suggested to the person who had their bitcoins stolen to mound a similar campaign, thus amassing the troops, so to speak, so that at least one person could reap the reward when the stolen bitcoins are returned.

The amount of bitcoins stolen was 1,132 BTC.

The person they were stolen from was me, Bruno Kucinskas, a.k.a. Phinnaeus Gage on this forum.

The bitcoins were stolen on April 1, 2013, during the infamous InstaWallet "hack".

The person who stole the bitcoins is David François (David Francois), a.k.a. davout of InstaWallet/Paymium, et al. and staff on this forum.

The bitcoins resided in two URL wallets: 1,000 BTC here https://www.instawallet.org/w/rL2DhMWW9tDvs24oFwtiq99zhh7A3ii6bg and 132 BTC here https://www.instawallet.org/w/gZh1afVVl5aAtjNwXo0BiYChTxjwln33ab

I filed three claims at the earliest possible time, the other being for only 0.835 BTC. At first David François wasn't going to honor that claim in spite of offering up various proof that that wallet was indeed mine. The reason for him not wanting to do such is because he knew that the IP associated with that one URL coincided with the the other two URLs Paymium continues to not recognize.

At the onset of the InstaWallet fiasco, all three URLs didn't have a bitcoin wallet associated with the generated pages. It wasn't till after I brought it to Boussac's attention that the lesser bitcoin-containing wallet was well-document that it mysterious had the associated wallet address visible on the URL generated site. This is why they refuse to release the name of the forensics auditor(s) because there wasn't one (or more, according to Boussac), in spite of them saying they couldn't because of some fuckin' idiotic NDA clause.

InstaWallet is now officially off-line in spite of ~20K wallets yet to be refunded, with only >1K wallets returned to their rightful owners, in spite of all the principals of Paymium being refunded first.

It is well-documented that David François announced a week prior to the "hack" that he was going on vacation for a week, but not returning to this forum until April 18, 2013, leaving Boussac - Pierre Noizat - to start and man a InstaWallet claims thread of which is now locked in spite of still owing ~20K wallet claims, according to their estimates.

After hundreds of requests, David François, et al. has refused to name the independent auditors (plural, according to Boussac, singular, according to davout, as stated on this forum) that conducted the investigation, over and beyond what the French PD supposedly conducted.

I firmly believe that my 1,132 BTC is currently residing in one of David François' fat-ass bitcoin wallets, namely https://blockchain.info/address/16d1yGrEDqSY1xhCnAUWrkahGY2mkWdAYk, of which 1,384.35491053 BTC can still be found there.

The above address was amassed during the shutdown of InstaWallet and Bitcoin-Central, with the funds funneled to said address above via some sort of creative Bitcoin Money Laundering, i.e. one of the gambling bitcoin dice sites (not Satoshi Dice).

All three principals of Paymium have acted like assholes during the entire InstaWallet fiasco to their non-customers, a term they coined and used.

Boussac put me on ignore from the moment I entered the InstaWallet claims thread.

Davout now has me on ignore and ceased all communications with me.

Boussac was approached in Amsterdam prior to going on stage at the recent Bitcoin conference held there, and refused to discuss any of the InstaWallet claims.

Bitcoin-Central, owned by David François, is supposedly backed by a bank, when in fact it's back by Lemon Way, an app provided, who three days prior to the InstaWallet "hack" inquired on its Twitter account how to go about obtaining bitcoins, all the while being walking distance from Paymium's backdoor.

Details of the 400 BTC bounty can be seen in Post #3 of this thread, with Post #2 reserved for when I'm duly compensated.

~Bruno Kucinskas

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[Phinnaeus Gage]

Reserved to announced that I have reunited with my lost investment.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

At today's exchange rate, the 400 BTC bounty equates to over a quarter of million dollars, or exactly $255,416 USD.

I prefer to use Rassah as escrow so that anybody who's entitle to the bounty would have an extra layer of trust to guarantee that they do get paid.

I will pay a 2% escrow fee (over and beyond Rassah's standard fee structure) outta my share to not lessen any bounty payout.

Ideally, I prefer to have the entire 1,132 BTC, sans the 400 BTC bounty amount, paid in full to me, but knowing that sometimes arbitration takes place, I'm willing to settle for a minimal amount, with anybody acting as liaison to broker their reward up to 100% of what I may finally recognize. The minimum I'm welling to settle for is $50K USD via BTC or fiat to compensate for my initial investment and the mega hours I have put into this fiasco, not to mention the stress.

I have played this game long enough in good faith, but Paymium, et al. actions, now lack thereof, leaves me no choice but to pursue this route.

I've stated this before, and will now do so again: Anybody having funds in Bitcoin-Central best get them out ASAP, for I have a funny feeling that they're about to be investigated for fraud and money laundering.

~Bruno Kucinskas

[Maidak]

You had that many BTC on a online wallet service sorry for your loss.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

You had that many BTC on a online wallet service sorry for your loss.

So did others using InstaWallet, but they were refunded according to tx records, albeit they could've easily been Paymium's own funds from their various money laundering enterprises.

[BetMoose]

Way to keep it interesting Bruno. I read the whole thing.

You could have added that you're a Nigerian prince and I'd still believe you

Good luck with this!

[Nammi]

Nice bounty....I'm fairly new to this forum but read quite a bit about your quest to get your BTC back. Hopefully this will help.

[tvbcof]

I've watched the whole Instawallet fiasco like a hawk because I had some BTC in Instawallet.  Only a small fraction of my holdings, and what I could easily afford to lose of course, but it's a personal affront and embarrassing to me to get screwed by (likely) criminals.  I got my bitcoins back with the first round of payouts BTW.

Whenever these things happen there are a handful of people (probably) who will make dubious claims and a lot of noise hoping that the party responsible will find the path of least resistance to just pay them off.  In PG's case it seems that his story was relayed early and has remained the same through the well over a year that this thing has been in play.  That is not what one usually sees when someone is trying to pull a fast one.  I think the odds are quite high that PG's story and claim is completely legit.

PG has been his normal self and obviously very frustrated through this adventure.  Not always a model of diplomacy.  That still does not give davout and boussac a justification to steal from him IMHO.  Nor does the fact that it would cost them a fairly large chunk of change to do the right thing.  (BTW, I would not rule out the possiblity that Boussac himself is a victim of davout to some extent.)

In the interest of being complete, I do have to note that PG seemed to go through a brief but suspicious period of shilling for the infamous scammers at BFL (between rounds of being their worst enemy.)  I forgot about that when I donated a bitcoin to the 100 charity thing a few months ago.  Anyway, aside from that I've seen no reason to be suspicious that he wouldn't do what he says.  I would love to see davout have to cough up the 1300 BTC he very likely stole, and I'd love to see the details of the collection remittance disclosed publicly.  And the details of the extraction for that matter.  If feasible.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I've watched the whole Instawallet fiasco like a hawk because I had some BTC in Instawallet.  Only a small fraction of my holdings, and what I could easily afford to lose of course, but it's a personal affront and embarrassing to me to get screwed by (likely) criminals.  I got my bitcoins back with the first round of payouts BTW.

Whenever these things happen there are a handful of people (probably) who will make dubious claims and a lot of noise hoping that the party responsible will find the path of least resistance to just pay them off.  In PG's case it seems that his story was relayed early and has remained the same through the well over a year that this thing has been in play.  That is not what one usually sees when someone is trying to pull a fast one.  I think the odds are quite high that PG's story and claim is completely legit.

PG has been his normal self and obviously very frustrated through this adventure.  Not always a model of diplomacy.  That still does not give davout and boussac a justification to steal from him IMHO.  Nor does the fact that it would cost them a fairly large chunk of change to do the right thing.  (BTW, I would not rule out the possiblity that Boussac himself is a victim of davout to some extent.)

In the interest of being complete, I do have to note that PG seemed to go through a brief but suspicious period of shilling for the infamous scammers at BFL (between rounds of being their worst enemy.)  I forgot about that when I donated a bitcoin to the 100 charity thing a few months ago.  Anyway, aside from that I've seen no reason to be suspicious that he wouldn't do what he says.  I would love to see davout have to cough up the 1300 BTC he very likely stole, and I'd love to see the details of the collection remittance disclosed publicly.  And the details of the extraction for that matter.  If feasible.

It kinda occurred to me that Boussac may have been played by davout, but his actions at the onset of the InstaWallet fiasco are/were in-line with davout's.

Don't worry about the 1 BTC you sent to Bitcoin 100, for it surely will go to some good cause. I'm simply the founder of it, never ever having control of a single satoshi that passes through it. Not another person affiliated with Bitcoin 100 gets a single satoshi for themselves. Any moneys that any principals received came outta my pocket, most of which was also donated.

BFL. Please recall that I have dug up more dirt on them then all others combined, and kinda ran outta ammo, hence scaling back my attacks. I and bcp19 toured their plant, then went to a KC meetup that Goat put together. It wasn't till after I was about to leave the Meetup that Josh gave me a sub-par Single in the parking lot, of which I sold. Josh also reimburse my traveling expenses and one night hotel stay, even though I was on the road for over 3 days, opting to only turn in one night's stay, bunking with bcp19 (two beds, if that needs to be said). I was fair with the billing, of which Josh/BFL was kind enough to round up a tad, all of which I donated away, including moneys from the sale of the sub-par Single since I don't mine. In total, less than $600 I was able to amass outta $700-$800 trip expense, of which I'm pretty sure I donated over $1,500 during that particular time frame.

Apologies for bragging above, but wanted to put into perspective. But, I will brad a tad now: I've donated tens of thousands to date toward a couple local chapters here in Sandwich, IL, that benefit autistic adults, for I have a special place in my heart for them folks. Unfortunately, it's all in fiat. Currently, I'm negotiating a lease for a 5 bedroom farm house for the same group, but different adults, willing to pay two years worth of lease payments up front since the state is so strapped for funds. No apologies this time for bragging.

BTW, the above events you've stated took place from the later part of September, forward. InstaWallet's "hack" took place on April 1, 2013, thus that event and anything similar to the above that others may try to claim as some sort of bearing to some motive I may have will not cut the mustard because they're mutually exclusive.

That said, thank you so kindly, tvbcof, for your post.

~Bruno Kucinskas

[S4VV4S]

Ideally, I prefer to have the entire 1,132 BTC, sans the 400 BTC bounty amount, paid in full to me, but knowing that sometimes arbitration takes place, I'm willing to settle for a minimal amount, with anybody acting as liaison to broker their reward up to 100% of what I may finally recognize. The minimum I'm welling to settle for is $50K USD via BTC or fiat to compensate for my initial investment and the mega hours I have put into this fiasco, not to mention the stress.

PG, I am a little confused with the above part.

You will offer 400BTC and are willing to settle for $50K?
Is that what it says?

Also, how do you expect someone to get your BTC back for you?

For that amount of BTC I am sure you can find some sort of legal way to force conduct an investigation by someone (or more) with expertise on the matter.

[justusranvier]

I've watched the whole Instawallet fiasco like a hawk because I had some BTC in Instawallet.

I never used Instalwallet, but I did keep an eye on how davout and boussac behaved during and after the incident because they are involved in other Bitcoin projects.

The way they handled the situation looks to me consistent with what I'd expect from scammers.

Honest people would show some signs of remorse and humility after losing so much of other people's money - they were arrogant and hostile instead.

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Ideally, I prefer to have the entire 1,132 BTC, sans the 400 BTC bounty amount, paid in full to me, but knowing that sometimes arbitration takes place, I'm willing to settle for a minimal amount, with anybody acting as liaison to broker their reward up to 100% of what I may finally recognize. The minimum I'm welling to settle for is $50K USD via BTC or fiat to compensate for my initial investment and the mega hours I have put into this fiasco, not to mention the stress.

PG, I am a little confused with the above part.

You will offer 400BTC and are willing to settle for $50K?
Is that what it says?

Also, how do you expect someone to get your BTC back for you?

For that amount of BTC I am sure you can find some sort of legal way to force conduct an investigation by someone (or more) with expertise on the matter.

Foregoing allocating legal fees unless Paymium opts to sue me for libel, of which I'm on record stating that I would welcome such, stemming all the way back to April of last year. I'm opting to go the Roger Ver route, being that this is Bitcoin and all.

The settlement aspect is fair, thrown in for what it's worth knowing realistically that it may come to such via some sort of arbitration, albeit I'm not versed on how such works, but I can surmise.

Don't know exactly how others could help via acting as some sort of liaison, but hoping that maybe some chap close to Paymium's principals can put some sort of pressure on them, sans violence, of course.

Also, some more press on this would be welcome, hopefully bringing Bitcoin-Central to a halt, see that it's last of the Mohicans from all the VC moneys Paymium amassed with nothing to show for it but a handful of failed and hacked attempts at startups.

For I care, Lemon Way could go to the wayside as well, seeing that they're now affiliated with Paymium and I don't trust them.

Hope that addresses your questions and concerns, bud.

~Bruno Kucinskas

[S4VV4S]

Ideally, I prefer to have the entire 1,132 BTC, sans the 400 BTC bounty amount, paid in full to me, but knowing that sometimes arbitration takes place, I'm willing to settle for a minimal amount, with anybody acting as liaison to broker their reward up to 100% of what I may finally recognize. The minimum I'm welling to settle for is $50K USD via BTC or fiat to compensate for my initial investment and the mega hours I have put into this fiasco, not to mention the stress.

PG, I am a little confused with the above part.

You will offer 400BTC and are willing to settle for $50K?
Is that what it says?

Also, how do you expect someone to get your BTC back for you?

For that amount of BTC I am sure you can find some sort of legal way to force conduct an investigation by someone (or more) with expertise on the matter.

Foregoing allocating legal fees unless Paymium opts to sue me for libel, of which I'm on record stating that I would welcome such, stemming all the way back to April of last year. I'm opting to go the Roger Ver route, being that this is Bitcoin and all.

The settlement aspect is fair, thrown in for what it's worth knowing realistically that it may come to such via some sort of arbitration, albeit I'm not versed on how such works, but I can surmise.

Don't know exactly how others could help via acting as some sort of liaison, but hoping that maybe some chap close to Paymium's principals can put some sort of pressure on them, sans violence, of course.

Hope that addresses your questions and concerns, bud.

~Bruno Kucinskas

What if you sue them for fraud?
Wouldn't that start a legal investigation on the matter?

[PodBayDoors]

What is it about FRENCH GUYS and Bitcoin?

Karpeles, those Dealco guys out of HK, now these scammers

French Bitcoiner = AVOID

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Ideally, I prefer to have the entire 1,132 BTC, sans the 400 BTC bounty amount, paid in full to me, but knowing that sometimes arbitration takes place, I'm willing to settle for a minimal amount, with anybody acting as liaison to broker their reward up to 100% of what I may finally recognize. The minimum I'm welling to settle for is $50K USD via BTC or fiat to compensate for my initial investment and the mega hours I have put into this fiasco, not to mention the stress.

PG, I am a little confused with the above part.

You will offer 400BTC and are willing to settle for $50K?
Is that what it says?

Also, how do you expect someone to get your BTC back for you?

For that amount of BTC I am sure you can find some sort of legal way to force conduct an investigation by someone (or more) with expertise on the matter.

Foregoing allocating legal fees unless Paymium opts to sue me for libel, of which I'm on record stating that I would welcome such, stemming all the way back to April of last year. I'm opting to go the Roger Ver route, being that this is Bitcoin and all.

The settlement aspect is fair, thrown in for what it's worth knowing realistically that it may come to such via some sort of arbitration, albeit I'm not versed on how such works, but I can surmise.

Don't know exactly how others could help via acting as some sort of liaison, but hoping that maybe some chap close to Paymium's principals can put some sort of pressure on them, sans violence, of course.

Hope that addresses your questions and concerns, bud.

~Bruno Kucinskas

What if you sue them for fraud?
Wouldn't that start a legal investigation on the matter?

I desire them to sue me first for libel, then and only then will I take action. To date, they have failed to follow through with their threat that they will do such, probably knowing that it's not to their best interest.

~Bruno Kucinskas

[Phinnaeus Gage]

What is it about FRENCH GUYS and Bitcoin?

Karpeles, those Dealco guys out of HK, now these scammers

French Bitcoiner = AVOID

Blame it on Canada is a song if I'm not mistaken.

[steelboy]

Good luck Phin. I hope this gets resolved.  

[madmat]

What is it about FRENCH GUYS and Bitcoin?

Karpeles, those Dealco guys out of HK, now these scammers

French Bitcoiner = AVOID

All 57 million french people are dangerous scammers. Even if they don't use bitcoin !!!

[Phinnaeus Gage]

I've watched the whole Instawallet fiasco like a hawk because I had some BTC in Instawallet.

I never used Instalwallet, but I did keep an eye on how davout and boussac behaved during and after the incident because they are involved in other Bitcoin projects.

The way they handled the situation looks to me consistent with what I'd expect from scammers.

Honest people would show some signs of remorse and humility after losing so much of other people's money - they were arrogant and hostile instead.

I loved InstaWallet. I couldn't endorse them enough prior to the "hack" online and off. I trusted them, only for them to stick it up my ass. Well, it's my motherfuckin' time to stick it up their ass as deep I can stick it.

Bottom line, I will do everything in my power to bury these French bastards so that they won't have the opportunity again to fuck with people's money.

~Bruno Kucinskas

[Phinnaeus Gage]

What is it about FRENCH GUYS and Bitcoin?

Karpeles, those Dealco guys out of HK, now these scammers

French Bitcoiner = AVOID

All 57 million french people are dangerous scammers. Even if they don't use bitcoin !!!

That many?


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