Is There Any Chance?

[bitcoinmining]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

[1715124889]

1715124889

[inBitweTrust]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

Depends upon what you mean by lost. If you mean they forgot about a device or wallet or find a Casascius coin in their couch than sure, otherwise never and those lost coins represents a deflationary "donation" to the community.

[bradleyb5155]

How exactly does the "private keys" work? If you guess the correct key do you have access to the wallet, given there is no encryption?

[inBitweTrust]

How exactly does the "private keys" work? If you guess the correct key do you have access to the wallet, given there is no encryption?

Having unencrypted access to the private keys means you can move or spend the funds on the public ledger. Essentially, those that control the private keys own the money associated to those keys.

[segvec]

If there were, I'd be a multi-million dollar man right now.
/thread.

[twister]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

Nope. It's not possible. If that was possible hackers would find any key and steal BTC from any one.

[jonald_fyookball]

How exactly does the "private keys" work? If you guess the correct key do you have access to the wallet, given there is no encryption?

Sure.  Just like if you can guess where pirates buried treasure a few centureis ago, and dig there,
you would have access to the booty.   So, yeah... "good luck" with that one.

[bitcoinmining]

How exactly does the "private keys" work? If you guess the correct key do you have access to the wallet, given there is no encryption?

Sure.  Just like if you can guess where pirates buried treasure a few centureis ago, and dig there,
you would have access to the booty.   So, yeah... "good luck" with that one.

Yeah I was imagining something like that, it would be fun to find someone else's lost 500 Bitcoin like finding old treasure 

[shorena]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

Jup, 1 in 2¹⁶⁰ multiplied by the number of private keys that have spendable coins on them. In order words: dont even bother.

How exactly does the "private keys" work? If you guess the correct key do you have access to the wallet, given there is no encryption?

If you guess the correct key you have access to the funds there. Since there are 2⁹⁶ private keys for each address it does not even have to be that same exact private key. Encryption does not matter in this case. Its like guessing a password. The private keys are only encrypted so your wallet file is harder to temper with.

-snip-
Sure.  Just like if you can guess where pirates buried treasure a few centureis ago, and dig there,
you would have access to the booty.   So, yeah... "good luck" with that one.

Chances to find a lost chest a pirate burried are higher than finding a private key that has coins.

[cryptworld]

If there were, I'd be a multi-million dollar man right now.
/thread.

actually no,because bitcoin value would drop to zero

[thompete]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

I think it will be useless. The amount of coins lost because of this could be upto a million, but hard to say or predict.
Maybe, after 10 years an app will come out, to show what amount of coins have not moved in the last 10 years.

[Q7]

Unless that account holds significant amount of bitcoin like probably few hundred thousands, i believe technologically people can still find a way to recover the private key. Whether they invest in super hardware or by other means, it will just take considerably long time to do that. But first the question is.... is the reward worth all the trouble???

[rz20]

It is impossible to find a lost key, you won't be able to recover it ever, so they are lost forever.

[thompete]

It is impossible to find a lost key, you won't be able to recover it ever, so they are lost forever.

Its impossible to find a lost key belonging to another individual. But if people lost it in a computer crash or backup, then they might be recoverable.

[Flashman]

You are more likely to catch a fish that swallowed a USB drive with an unencrypted BTC wallet on, than come up with a valid method of cracking private keys.

[rz20]

It is impossible to find a lost key, you won't be able to recover it ever, so they are lost forever.

Its impossible to find a lost key belonging to another individual. But if people lost it in a computer crash or backup, then they might be recoverable.

Sure. This is why you should always save you keys in a paper or in an electrum seed.

[cheekychap]

You are more likely to catch a fish that swallowed a USB drive with an unencrypted BTC wallet on, than come up with a valid method of cracking private keys.

Even if you do come about cracking private keys, it might not be of someone, who lost his provate keys. Would be quite random I suppose.

[Febo]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

Ofcourse.


Is there chance to find ships that was sink in 15 century bringing Gold to spain from South America?  Yes with new technology it is.

So in 10-20-30 years, people will search fro such wallets for a living. try to get passwords.

[jonald_fyookball]

-snip-
Sure.  Just like if you can guess where pirates buried treasure a few centureis ago, and dig there,
you would have access to the booty.   So, yeah... "good luck" with that one.

Chances to find a lost chest a pirate burried are higher than finding a private key that has coins.

please provide your analysis on that probability.

[inBitweTrust]

please provide your analysis on that probability.

This video does exactly that :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZloHVKk7DHk

[AGD]

[Pic of the sun with explanation how difficult it is to crack a random private key]

[allthingsluxury]

I believe this to be very unlikely, I'm sure some could be found, but certainly not all.

[FUR11]

You are more likely to catch a fish that swallowed a USB drive with an unencrypted BTC wallet on, than come up with a valid method of cracking private keys.

This is an awesome analogy! I really wonder whether there are flash drives that have been swallowed by a fish. Maybe even with a private key stored on them. I think the best chances are in dumping the contents of old hard-drives and trying to extract unencrypted Bitcoin private keys from them.

[johnyj]

Lost somewhere in the galaxy 18...

[thms]

Is there any chance to find those lost BTCs' private keys? Lots of early BTC adopters lost their private key and  thousands of BTC is now useless...

It is possible but you would need a huge amount of luck..

It's better to just play the lottery because the chances of winning the lottery is higher and the prize is probably higher too.

[Ron~Popeil]

Math makes it incredibly unlikely but anything is technically possible. You would make more btc hitting faucets a few times a day.

[Flashman]

True, faucets, expected return per man hour spent, about 2000 satoshis or so, h4xx0ring teh gibson blockchain or private keys, expected return per hour invested 0.000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 satoshi

[shorena]

-snip-
Sure.  Just like if you can guess where pirates buried treasure a few centureis ago, and dig there,
you would have access to the booty.   So, yeah... "good luck" with that one.

Chances to find a lost chest a pirate burried are higher than finding a private key that has coins.

please provide your analysis on that probability.

Just a wild guess, but given that the propabiltiy of finding a private key for a certain address (e.g. one that has coins) is roughly the same as finding a single bucky ball [1] within the earths crust I am pretty sure it stands a deeper analysis.

please provide your analysis on that probability.

This video does exactly that :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZloHVKk7DHk

Didnt watch it fully, but I like it.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buckminsterfullerene

[hhanh00]

The main issue I have with all these 'proof' of difficulty is that they assume it's perfectly random.
In fact, they ignore the type of encryption used and focus exclusively on the length. 256 bits then 2^256 possibilities. Way higher than the age of universe to hack - agreed.

But then why is a PGP 256 bit key (RSA to be pedantic) completely unsafe but the Bitcoin 256 bit key safe?

Reference
Cryptographic key length recommendations: http://www.keylength.com

[jonald_fyookball]

The main issue I have with all these 'proof' of difficulty is that they assume it's perfectly random.
In fact, they ignore the type of encryption used and focus exclusively on the length. 256 bits then 2^256 possibilities. Way higher than the age of universe to hack - agreed.

But then why is a PGP 256 bit key (RSA to be pedantic) completely unsafe but the Bitcoin 256 bit key safe?

Reference
Cryptographic key length recommendations: http://www.keylength.com

You answered your own question partially.  

It's all about the type of encryption and how many bits
of security it really provides, not the key length.
And this in turn is based on the kinds of algorithms
that can find a solution most efficiently.

Elliptic curve cryptography is excellent because
it it only requires 2 characters for each bit of
security.  

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_curve_cryptography:

Since all the fastest known algorithms that allow one to solve the ECDLP (baby-step giant-step, Pollard's rho, etc.), need O(\sqrt{n}) steps, it follows that the size of the underlying field should be roughly twice the security parameter. For example, for 128-bit security one needs a curve over \mathbb{F}_q, where q \approx 2^{256}. This can be contrasted with finite-field cryptography (e.g., DSA) which requires[17] 3072-bit public keys and 256-bit private keys, and integer factorization cryptography (e.g., RSA) which requires a 3072-bit value of n, where the private key should be just as large. However the public key may be smaller to accommodate efficient encryption, especially when processing power is limited.

So you get 128 bits of security with Bitcoin.  This is further increased
to 160 bits for an unspent address because of RIPEMD-160 hash.

[redsn0w]

[Pic of the sun with explanation how difficult it is to crack a random private key]

Do you mean this :

[LewiesMan]

All the better for the economy.

Less supply

=

Scarcer resource

=

Price up

[hhanh00]

The main issue I have with all these 'proof' of difficulty is that they assume it's perfectly random.
In fact, they ignore the type of encryption used and focus exclusively on the length. 256 bits then 2^256 possibilities. Way higher than the age of universe to hack - agreed.

But then why is a PGP 256 bit key (RSA to be pedantic) completely unsafe but the Bitcoin 256 bit key safe?

Reference
Cryptographic key length recommendations: http://www.keylength.com

You answered your own question partially.  

It's all about the type of encryption and how many bits
of security it really provides, not the key length.
And this in turn is based on the kinds of algorithms
that can find a solution most efficiently.

Elliptic curve cryptography is excellent because
it it only requires 2 characters for each bit of
security.  

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliptic_curve_cryptography:

Since all the fastest known algorithms that allow one to solve the ECDLP (baby-step giant-step, Pollard's rho, etc.), need O(\sqrt{n}) steps, it follows that the size of the underlying field should be roughly twice the security parameter. For example, for 128-bit security one needs a curve over \mathbb{F}_q, where q \approx 2^{256}. This can be contrasted with finite-field cryptography (e.g., DSA) which requires[17] 3072-bit public keys and 256-bit private keys, and integer factorization cryptography (e.g., RSA) which requires a 3072-bit value of n, where the private key should be just as large. However the public key may be smaller to accommodate efficient encryption, especially when processing power is limited.

So you get 128 bits of security with Bitcoin.  This is further increased
to 160 bits for an unspent address because of RIPEMD-160 hash.

Hehe - I know, I have to admit I was trolling.  

Now that you confirmed that. What about the following picture which has fancy words like 'thermodynamics', 'dyson sphere', and my personal favorite - "the laws of the universe" - mmm?



Though it's a nice photoshop and I'm sure it won't be the last time it shows up.

[Flashman]

You are more likely to catch a fish that swallowed a USB drive with an unencrypted BTC wallet on, than come up with a valid method of cracking private keys.

This is an awesome analogy! I really wonder whether there are flash drives that have been swallowed by a fish. Maybe even with a private key stored on them. I think the best chances are in dumping the contents of old hard-drives and trying to extract unencrypted Bitcoin private keys from them.

Then there's the other more profitable activity, standing in the back yard with your mouth open, waiting for a meteorite to land on your tongue.

[canary]

I wish I had a way to gain those missing BTC back to the market, I mean back to my pocket.