[Emergency ANN] Bitcoinica site is taken offline for security investigation

[the joint]

this is why the website need to be UP asap and if is needed bitcoinica should manually process any withdraw, you need to understand that you can separate ppl from their money for a weekend(48h) just like that, the end result will be worse monday

well said!!

Not well said.

Bitcoin users need to understand that exchanges like Bitcoinica and Gox CAN, WILL, and DO separate people from their money for a weekend or longer.

I understand this is a very stressful time for a lot of people, but it is your money and your responsibility.  That's the Bitcoin idea remember?  The power of money is returned to the people?  Well own up to it!

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[SgtSpike]

Not well said.

Bitcoin users need to understand that exchanges like Bitcoinica and Gox CAN, WILL, and DO separate people from their money for a weekend or longer.

I understand this is a very stressful time for a lot of people, but it is your money and your responsibility.  That's the Bitcoin idea remember?  The power of money is returned to the people?  Well own up to it!

Haha, I was thinking the same thing.

People want complete control over their money without any rules and regulations holding them back, but then are in an uproar when an unregulated company does something that they don't like without any regulations to stop them.

[muyuu]

Am I going to get my money back from bitcoinica?

if i dont get my money back they should all go to jail. this is bs.

there is no need to shut down the site.

i want my money out now not on monday wtf

this is why the website need to be UP asap and if is needed bitcoinica should manually process any withdraw, you need to understand that you can separate ppl from their money for a weekend(48h) just like that, the end result will be worse monday

You guys need to understand that they first have to investigate how did it happen, right? it would be extremely reckless to relaunch the site otherwise. They also need to discuss their strategy internally without having to worry about the site.

[Raoul Duke]

Not well said.

Bitcoin users need to understand that exchanges like Bitcoinica and Gox CAN, WILL, and DO separate people from their money for a weekend or longer.

I understand this is a very stressful time for a lot of people, but it is your money and your responsibility.  That's the Bitcoin idea remember?  The power of money is returned to the people?  Well own up to it!

Haha, I was thinking the same thing.

People want complete control over their money without any rules and regulations holding them back, but then are in an uproar when an unregulated company does something that they don't like without any regulations to stop them.

These guys want none of that. These are the type of persons who are here for the Dollars, not for the Bitcoins
Fuck them, I say.

[davout]

it is your money and your responsibility.  That's the Bitcoin idea remember?  The power of money is returned to the people?

This theft is not a bug, it's a feature.

[JusticeForYou]

it is your money and your responsibility.  That's the Bitcoin idea remember?  The power of money is returned to the people?

This theft is not a bug, it's a feature.

LOL, quite true.

Let see: I have control over my money; I give it to someone else to control; they loose the money; it's their fault, not mine; give me my money back; we can't that is the 'feature' of bitcoin.

People are learning, slowly but surly, they are.

Soon these 'official' bitcoin businesses will have to have BDIC (Bitcoin Deposit Insurance Corporation) Insurance for deposits.

Hey, there is an idea. Someone sell bonds for it on GLBSE.

[Otoh]

ah cool, 48 hrs to plan the perfect 1.7M $ spike to 20 $ ~ it's all going according to plan  

[giszmo]

subscribing

also subscribing

[David M]

Another theft?

=> Checks wallets.....
=> Balances nominal
=> Continues with life...

[Otoh]

test spike to > 5 $ = all OK

It's rough, soon to be tough (soon to be unemployed) JP Morgan trader lined up = check

don't do it man, jees it's only like 6 B $ (& counting) of someonelese's money, tax payer will cover that shit if needs be np, chill.

Willkommen! Bienvenue! Welcome!

so, time for some moonlighting yep, sweet how about drop 2$M on Bitcorn - it could just be your future pension fund now

always look on the bright side of life .. tra la la

[Qoheleth]

test spike to > 5 $ = all OK

It's rough (soon to be unemployed) JP Morgan trader lined up = check

don't do it man, jees it's only like 6 B $ (& counting) of someonelese's money, tax payer will cover that np, chill

so, time for some moonlighting yep, sweet how about drop 2$M on Bitcorn - it could just be your pension now

I am having a hard time parsing this post.

[dizzy1]

It is with much regret that we write to inform our users of a recent security breach at Bitcoinica. At approximately 1:00pm GMT, our live production servers were compromised by an attacker and they used this access to deplete our online wallet of 18547 BTC.

We will learn more as we investigate, but would like to address early concerns.
We have suspended operations while we focus on our investigation.
The overwhelming majority of our bitcoin deposits were not stolen.
The thief stole from us not you. All withdrawal requests will be honored.
The database was most likely compromised.

The last point has important implications for the following:

PASSWORDS
Bitcoinica uses the most stringent best practices for password security.* Therefore, it is extremely unlikely that even full database access would give the attacker knowledge of your Bitcoinica password. It is always best not to reuse passwords among different online services and we recommend changing passwords if you have done this.

IDENTIFYING DOCUMENTS
All identifying documents for verified customers are stored on separate servers at a separate data center and separately encrypted. Even full access to website database would not give the attacker access to this data.

USER INFORMATION
Other user information that you've provided upon account creation is stored in the database. If the attacker has full access to the database, they would have access to this information. This would include your username, email and account history, but not information about your banking details outside of Bitcoinca. Users should be especially suspicious of any emails received to your Bitcoinica email address. It is always a best practice to never click an email link to login to any online service.

We're providing this notice primarily for the protection of our users.

We will have more to say soon about the circumstances surrounding this attack and what we will do to handle it.

- The Bitcoinica Team




* For the technically inclined, we salt and encrypt passwords with bcrypt.
Posted 36 minutes ago by Bitcoinica

bitcoinica.blogspot.com

Where do we send withdrawl requests?

[davout]

Where do we send withdrawl requests?

/dev/null

[JusticeForYou]

Where do we send withdrawl requests?

/dev/null

The Bit Bucket might be more apropos in this situation.

[bitcoinBull]

The Bitcoin Consultancy is certainly having a bad couple of weeks. Couldn't have happened at a worse time for them.

Looking forward to the full report.

[JusticeForYou]

The Bitcoin Consultancy is certainly having a bad couple of weeks. Couldn't have happened at a worse time for them.

Looking forward to the full report.

Well in fairness to them, I don't believe they were immediately made aware of the issue which is an issue in itself.

[rebuilder]

So now everyone has their panties in a bunch over withdrawals - what about open positions, especially if the market moves significantly before bitcoinica reopens? I fear that's when the real fun starts...

Fingers crossed for a quick resolution to this affair.

[shockD]

This is awful.

I think some people are being too harsh on Zhou. He has proven to be an honest person, with greater achievements in life than most, if not all, the participants of this thread. And that even before completing 18 years old! He deserves a lot of respect.

Eh, honest perhaps, and points for ambition but none really for being able to run a secure financial application.

This is someone who's managed to get ~60K BTC stolen from them in two separate incidents. I don't think it's harsh for people to be calling his abilities into question. Those screaming for the site to be reopened do not have any kind of grasp of the situation though.

[bbulker]

Where do we send withdrawl requests?

/dev/null

lmao

[Littleshop]

I should thank the owner for making me feel burned pretty early on (over a small amount).  I had $2 over there.