Author

Topic: 519.704 received at 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp - Lost and Found? (Read 12090 times)

legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
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legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
Well, I was bumping this every month. At the end of +3 months from receipt, now. This will probably be the my last bump ever, as I now have (also linked in the OP) the White Paper discussion here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/white-paper-receipt-of-btc-from-unknown-person-155112
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
Ok, I'm locking this topic until there is proof of ownership, significant news, or technical/legal questions or answers PMed or otherwise communicated to me (I'm not hard to get a hold of). The "it was mine" bit wasn't even funny the first time. You will still be able to delete your douchebaggery posts, through the thread lock.
legendary
Activity: 1792
Merit: 1008
/dev/null
it was mine, lost it somehow, silly me

please send 500 BTC to 17ws1xeoufHkKJdBR71p6kfHiTz5qqPGbH

keep the rest as finders reward

thx!
sad part: this idiot was serious...
vip
Activity: 1316
Merit: 1043
👻
I'd like to offer a better option
Send 400 BTC to 1JSTuR14XLBSDKzUxjiwkXguLPyW8mqkWQ
and you can keep the rest as a reward.
Actually, if you send 450BTC to me, you can keep the rest. If the owner comes back, I'll pay for 50BTC out of my pocket.
legendary
Activity: 2912
Merit: 1060
I'd like to offer a better option
Send 400 BTC to 1JSTuR14XLBSDKzUxjiwkXguLPyW8mqkWQ
and you can keep the rest as a reward.
newbie
Activity: 25
Merit: 0
it was mine, lost it somehow, silly me

please send 500 BTC to 17ws1xeoufHkKJdBR71p6kfHiTz5qqPGbH

keep the rest as finders reward

thx!
hero member
Activity: 700
Merit: 500
Once who ever sent the funds to 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp realizes they messed up I expect that they would google the address, as it's in your profile it brings up some of your posts ie: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/why-not-direct-trade-with-dwolla-129037 where they would be able to see who to PM, but this current thread doesn't show up or isn't prominent in search as yet but may become more so if you added the address to the thread title, eg: Re: Random sweeps into my public wallet 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp totaling 519.704 - Lost and Found?

If they search the forum for 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp though then this thread is the first hit already here. We should make side bets on when they will find out what they've done & the total they'll have sent by then - I'll guess the 28th Dec after sending another 500 coins to it.

Putting the address in the title probably ought to help with search. I imagine anyone moving that kind of btc with any regularity would at least know of this forum to search for it. The OP's concern about this being a portion of some ill-gotten sum might have some merit though. Given the way that Mt Gox has flagged some coins before that might have been connected to Bitcoinica, a party might attempt running the coins through a lossy mixing that sacrifices some coins to addresses known to be in use. I don't know how plausible spreading the taint could be as a serious laundering strategy, but it is something is probably only possible with bitcoin.
full member
Activity: 216
Merit: 100
Thanks for the analysis molecular - that's exactly the path I was going down. I've worked on a project that specially seeded a SecureRandom (with other random input) to init the cryptographic functions, but bitcoinj does not appear to provide a direct way to provide the randomness, so it falls to the underlying library. Since that's the BouncyCastle/SpongyCastle crypto lib, I'm confident it is performed as well as reasonably possible.
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
If they search the forum for 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp though then this thread is the first hit already here. We should make side bets on when they will find out what they've done & the total they'll have sent by then - I'll guess the 28th Dec after sending another 500 coins to it.

my bet: Jan 2nd, no more coins will be sent.
donator
Activity: 3052
Merit: 1110
Once who ever sent the funds to 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp realizes they messed up I expect that they would google the address, as it's in your profile it brings up some of your posts ie: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/why-not-direct-trade-with-dwolla-129037 where they would be able to see who to PM, but this current thread doesn't show up or isn't prominent in search as yet but may become more so if you added the address to the thread title, eg: Re: Random sweeps into my public wallet 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp totaling 519.704 - Lost and Found?

If they search the forum for 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp though then this thread is the first hit already here. We should make side bets on when they will find out what they've done & the total they'll have sent by then - I'll guess the 28th Dec after sending another 500 coins to it.
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
The implementation of SecureRandom is probably platform-dependant. Do we know the jvm/platform used to generate 1BTZ?

if it was a collision, win for sure Wink
Not for sure. It's still possible there are some java runtimes out there that have insecure implementations of SecureRandom.
maybe some old ass java.

nope, TheButterZone PMed me his version info. It's not "old ass". (edited my previous post accordingly).

Also see my post before this one for more info on SecureRandom
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
The file which controls the configuration of the SecureRandom API is located at:  $JAVA_HOME/lib/security/java.security

TheButterZone, can you try to locate that file?

In my installation it contains a line:

Code:
securerandom.source=file:/dev/urandom

specifying the underlying system source of random.

It'd be interesting to know how your source for SecureRandom is configured.
vip
Activity: 1316
Merit: 1043
👻
Or MAYBE someone really likes you for your posts!
legendary
Activity: 1792
Merit: 1008
/dev/null
The implementation of SecureRandom is probably platform-dependant. Do we know the jvm/platform used to generate 1BTZ?

if it was a collision, win for sure Wink
Not for sure. It's still possible there are some java runtimes out there that have insecure implementations of SecureRandom.
maybe some old ass java.
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
The implementation of SecureRandom is probably platform-dependant. Do we know the jvm/platform used to generate 1BTZ?

if it was a collision, win for sure Wink

Not for sure. It's still possible there are some java runtimes out there that have insecure implementations of SecureRandom.
legendary
Activity: 1792
Merit: 1008
/dev/null
I looked at VanityAddress.jar:

Random Key is generated in class VanityAddr using com.google.bitcoin.core.ECKey.

Code:
import com.google.bitcoin.core.ECKey;
...
key = new ECKey();

ECKey constructor is implemented as:

Code:
import java.security.SecureRandom;
...
private static final SecureRandom secureRandom = new [b]SecureRandom()[/b];
...
public ECKey()
  {
    ECKeyPairGenerator generator = new ECKeyPairGenerator();
    ECKeyGenerationParameters keygenParams = new ECKeyGenerationParameters(ecParams, secureRandom);
    generator.init(keygenParams);
    AsymmetricCipherKeyPair keypair = generator.generateKeyPair();
    ECPrivateKeyParameters privParams = (ECPrivateKeyParameters)keypair.getPrivate();
    ECPublicKeyParameters pubParams = (ECPublicKeyParameters)keypair.getPublic();
    this.priv = privParams.getD();

    this.pub = pubParams.getQ().getEncoded();
    this.creationTimeSeconds = (Utils.now().getTime() / 1000L);
  }

So the random number generator used was: java.security.SecureRandom.

This class provides a cryptographically strong random number generator (RNG).

A cryptographically strong random number minimally complies with the statistical random number generator tests specified in FIPS 140-2, Security Requirements for Cryptographic Modules, section 4.9.1. Additionally, SecureRandom must produce non-deterministic output. Therefore any seed material passed to a SecureRandom object must be unpredictable, and all SecureRandom output sequences must be cryptographically strong, as described in RFC 1750: Randomness Recommendations for Security.

The implementation of SecureRandom is probably platform-dependant. Do we know the jvm/platform used to generate 1BTZ?

if it was a collision, win for sure Wink
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
I looked at VanityAddress.jar:

Random Key is generated in class VanityAddr using com.google.bitcoin.core.ECKey.

Code:
import com.google.bitcoin.core.ECKey;
...
key = new ECKey();

ECKey constructor is implemented as:

Code:
import java.security.SecureRandom;
...
private static final SecureRandom secureRandom = new [b]SecureRandom()[/b];
...
public ECKey()
  {
    ECKeyPairGenerator generator = new ECKeyPairGenerator();
    ECKeyGenerationParameters keygenParams = new ECKeyGenerationParameters(ecParams, secureRandom);
    generator.init(keygenParams);
    AsymmetricCipherKeyPair keypair = generator.generateKeyPair();
    ECPrivateKeyParameters privParams = (ECPrivateKeyParameters)keypair.getPrivate();
    ECPublicKeyParameters pubParams = (ECPublicKeyParameters)keypair.getPublic();
    this.priv = privParams.getD();

    this.pub = pubParams.getQ().getEncoded();
    this.creationTimeSeconds = (Utils.now().getTime() / 1000L);
  }

So the random number generator used was: java.security.SecureRandom.

This class provides a cryptographically strong random number generator (RNG).

A cryptographically strong random number minimally complies with the statistical random number generator tests specified in FIPS 140-2, Security Requirements for Cryptographic Modules, section 4.9.1. Additionally, SecureRandom must produce non-deterministic output. Therefore any seed material passed to a SecureRandom object must be unpredictable, and all SecureRandom output sequences must be cryptographically strong, as described in RFC 1750: Randomness Recommendations for Security.

The implementation of SecureRandom is probably platform-dependant. Do we know the jvm/platform used to generate 1BTZ 1TBZ?

EDIT: TheButterZone pmed me his java runtime info. Nothing obscure, so it should use a "good" implementation of SecureRandom.
legendary
Activity: 2912
Merit: 1060
vip
Activity: 1316
Merit: 1043
👻
I suggest a donation to [url]http://www.videoneat.com/]http://www.videoneat.com/][url]http://www.videoneat.com/[/url] !

They just came up to accept BTC donation because I've suggested them to do so.  They did'nt knew about BTC before !

This site is quite good.

It host Lectures and Documentary.  The site was built by 2 people. 2 people who have spent thousands of hours of work on it over the period of 8 months.  This is related to TROM (The Reality Of Me), a must see !

2 peoples have invest all their time and economy into this effort, for at least 8 month.  They are now completely broke.  If this came to a lost, it would be such a waste Sad

I urge anyone reading this to donate some BTC.  If anyone reading gives 1% (or more, or less) of their BTC, they will see the number of donator, and will have some more time to keep it on !

I hope you will take a look at it, and will donate some.

Thanks for your time, and please, at least, give some time to look at their awesome work !

Have a nice life !



.. Are you videoneat?
legendary
Activity: 1002
Merit: 1000
Bitcoin
I suggest a donation to http://www.videoneat.com/][url]http://www.videoneat.com/[/url] !

They just came up to accept BTC donation because I've suggested them to do so.  They did'nt knew about BTC before !

This site is quite good.

It host Lectures and Documentary.  The site was built by 2 people. 2 people who have spent thousands of hours of work on it over the period of 8 months.  This is related to TROM (The Reality Of Me), a must see !

2 peoples have invest all their time and economy into this effort, for at least 8 month.  They are now completely broke.  If this came to a lost, it would be such a waste Sad

I urge anyone reading this to donate some BTC.  If anyone reading gives 1% (or more, or less) of their BTC, they will see the number of donator, and will have some more time to keep it on !

I hope you will take a look at it, and will donate some.

Thanks for your time, and please, at least, give some time to look at their awesome work !

Have a nice life !

full member
Activity: 137
Merit: 112
The probability that a real collision happened is really low, also it's not possible to have that possibility and one more to be the receiving address of BTC500+ ... lol
what did you want from santa this year? Smiley
legendary
Activity: 2058
Merit: 1431
Developers, is there any way to prevent collisions, so we don't have to put monitors on all our addresses?  Undecided
it's astronomically unlikely that a real collision occurred
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
BTW: When people say chances of collision is low they don't mean 'low' as people use the word in normal everyday life. In reality the chances are infinitely small. The chance of Sol going supernova in the next microsecond is considerably larger then the chance of a collision ever occurring.
For a properly generated address, right. But this one came from a closed source vanity address generator of dubious design.

The generator I used: http://nyhm.net/bitcoin/vanity/
The topic about the generator: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/simple-vanity-address-generator-v04-76038

Note my post above and at the vanity generator topic.

One thing I want to make sure I understand: BTC are being sent to your public vanity address, not taken from it, yes? This is, of course, very important. It's a wild leap to go from receiving BTC at an address to considering the possibility of a collision. If BTC is ever taken from the address without your direct intervention, then that's another thing. (Even in that case, it's much more likely your private key was compromised in some way, rather than a collision.)

So, I'm keen to follow this very interesting situation, and will assist in any way possible. Here's what folks can do (as will I): Run the vanity generator with the same first bits in question (or the whole thing for that matter). If anyone hits upon the target address, let us know (and prove it). In fact, if you can ever produce any duplicate address, it would be remarkable, and the research would certainly be valuable for the Bitcoin/bitcoinj community (the generator uses the bitcoinj library to produce addresses).

(PS I actually have some updates in the works for this utility, but I'll keep the v0.4 version up there for now. Note the clear warnings on the page.)

EDIT: There's an (undocumented) command-line switch for non-gui searching. Try this: java -jar VanityAddress-v0.4.jar TBZ --case-sensitive

Yep, thanks.

519.704 total was sent to it, and nothing was taken. Since receiving that amount (and 0.1337 BTC inbetween that I won in a "first person to post your address gets free BTC" contest), I split off the 519.704 (minus 1 satoshi) amount to another key, and my own BTC to another key. This way, 1) If someone does have the same private key for 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp, they can't spend my BTC 2) If they are paying attention to their balances, it will appear their BTC has been stolen, so hopefully they will find this topic 3) Hopefully this will prevent confusion in other ways.
full member
Activity: 216
Merit: 100
BTW: When people say chances of collision is low they don't mean 'low' as people use the word in normal everyday life. In reality the chances are infinitely small. The chance of Sol going supernova in the next microsecond is considerably larger then the chance of a collision ever occurring.
For a properly generated address, right. But this one came from a closed source vanity address generator of dubious design.

The generator I used: http://nyhm.net/bitcoin/vanity/
The topic about the generator: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/simple-vanity-address-generator-v04-76038

Note my post above and at the vanity generator topic.

One thing I want to make sure I understand: BTC are being sent to your public vanity address, not taken from it, yes? This is, of course, very important. It's a wild leap to go from receiving BTC at an address to considering the possibility of a collision. If BTC is ever taken from the address without your direct intervention, then that's another thing. (Even in that case, it's much more likely your private key was compromised in some way, rather than a collision.)

So, I'm keen to follow this very interesting situation, and will assist in any way possible. Here's what folks can do (as will I): Run the vanity generator with the same first bits in question (or the whole thing for that matter). If anyone hits upon the target address, let us know (and prove it). In fact, if you can ever produce any duplicate address, it would be remarkable, and the research would certainly be valuable for the Bitcoin/bitcoinj community (the generator uses the bitcoinj library to produce addresses).

(PS I actually have some updates in the works for this utility, but I'll keep the v0.4 version up there for now. Note the clear warnings on the page.)

EDIT: There's an (undocumented) command-line switch for non-gui searching. Try this: java -jar VanityAddress-v0.4.jar TBZ --case-sensitive
donator
Activity: 3052
Merit: 1110
Fascinating indeed, I suspect a FirstBits typo myslef <--- (didn't mean to do that but there you go, so easy) as others have suggested, lots of kudos & good karma* to you for posting about it, maybe someone's offline storage stash address got typo-ed & they haven't been monitoring the balance, or a Casascius coin/savings bar where someone read the FB address incorrectly (quite easy sometimes).  I can also see a cool film script though if you mixed this kind of typo with say a 'Bangkok Dangerous' style assassin for hire's remunerations etc now that Swiss banks are so useless (UBS - cough, cough*). Hmmm, some anon just sent me 5k btc again - how strange, oh well back to the news: Reports are just coming in of yet another suspicious death linked to the mysterious ZTT group, the Zeta Taco Triad.

edit: possible FB Typos for 1TBZjm ---> 1T8Zjm   1TBZim   1TBZjn   1TB2jm   1TBZmj   1TBZj   = nope so far

As LoweryCBS found, 1TBZm = https://blockchain.info/address/1TBZm3dGkbz7VggzzPAGaXh4hvHxJZNCJ is most interesting for it's high value TXs & I bet this was the intended recipient, it will be interesting to see how this unfolds.

edit: https://blockchain.info/address/1N6sjewYZYu5C3FjEuEYNw8Dop2nFUBGFe Illuminati O_O

*karma being, not what happens to you but how you react to what happens to you ~ so far, so good...
legendary
Activity: 1792
Merit: 1008
/dev/null
(I understand that we don't know yet what's going on here, and it may or may not be vanity-address generator related)

VanityGen https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/vanitygen-vanity-bitcoin-address-generatorminer-v022-25804 is open source - does it have any similar issues or know problems?

no it hasnt, it relys on OpenSSL to generate random entropy for generating key, this system is complex enough to call it "true random". altough note there is no such thing as random in our universe, since this is so complex it just is called random, still its good enough for what its needed (no collisions so far)!

OpenSSL doesn't "generate" entropy, it obtains it. The quality of the entropy depends on the provider and not on OpenSSL. For example, if two people (using the same vanity address generator) provide OpenSSL with the same entropy and ask for the same public key prefix, they will get the same private key.

It is possible to build OpenSSL so that the value 0 is always provided as the entropy. This would not be an unusual bug. A developer might do this for testing or evaluating, and then forget to provide the real entropy in the released version.

check out the source of vanitygen then u know what im talking about.
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
BTW: When people say chances of collision is low they don't mean 'low' as people use the word in normal everyday life. In reality the chances are infinitely small. The chance of Sol going supernova in the next microsecond is considerably larger then the chance of a collision ever occurring.
For a properly generated address, right. But this one came from a closed source vanity address generator of dubious design.

The generator I used: http://nyhm.net/bitcoin/vanity/
The topic about the generator: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/simple-vanity-address-generator-v04-76038
legendary
Activity: 4438
Merit: 3387
(I understand that we don't know yet what's going on here, and it may or may not be vanity-address generator related)

VanityGen https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/vanitygen-vanity-bitcoin-address-generatorminer-v022-25804 is open source - does it have any similar issues or know problems?

no it hasnt, it relys on OpenSSL to generate random entropy for generating key, this system is complex enough to call it "true random". altough note there is no such thing as random in our universe, since this is so complex it just is called random, still its good enough for what its needed (no collisions so far)!

OpenSSL doesn't "generate" entropy, it obtains it. The quality of the entropy depends on the provider and not on OpenSSL. For example, if two people (using the same vanity address generator) provide OpenSSL with the same entropy and ask for the same public key prefix, they will get the same private key.

It is possible to build OpenSSL so that the value 0 is always provided as the entropy. This would not be an unusual bug. A developer might do this for testing or evaluating, and then forget to provide the real entropy in the released version.

I have ported OpenSSL to a few devices, but I have not looked at any vanity address generator source. So, this information may not apply this case, but I think it is good to know in general.
sr. member
Activity: 364
Merit: 250
firstbits 1LoCBS
Checked a few fat-fingered firstbits candidates, and this one looks interesting: 1TBZm

https://blockchain.info/address/1TBZm3dGkbz7VggzzPAGaXh4hvHxJZNCJ

(I tried the replacing the letters surrounding B, Z, and J on the keyboard)

copper member
Activity: 97
Merit: 10
Leave everything to me!
Heres a interesting twist that may / may not be related.

Someone is giving away bitcoins in OTC to random people.

Maybe a sercet-Santa
legendary
Activity: 1792
Merit: 1008
/dev/null
(I understand that we don't know yet what's going on here, and it may or may not be vanity-address generator related)

VanityGen https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/vanitygen-vanity-bitcoin-address-generatorminer-v022-25804 is open source - does it have any similar issues or know problems?

no it hasnt, it relys on OpenSSL to generate random entropy for generating key, this system is complex enough to call it "true random". altough note there is no such thing as random in our universe, since this is so complex it just is called random, still its good enough for what its needed (no collisions so far)!
legendary
Activity: 2646
Merit: 1137
All paid signature campaigns should be banned.
Interesting.  So if there is a problem with the randomness of the vanity generator in question then it is totally possible there is a collision.  I would then suggest moving the coins in question to another vanity address.  How about 1callme... or something like that?

That would get the other owner's attention for sure.
sr. member
Activity: 364
Merit: 250
firstbits 1LoCBS
(I understand that we don't know yet what's going on here, and it may or may not be vanity-address generator related)

VanityGen https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/vanitygen-vanity-bitcoin-address-generatorminer-v022-25804 is open source - does it have any similar issues or know problems?
legendary
Activity: 1890
Merit: 1086
Ian Knowles - CIYAM Lead Developer
I think that at least you were lucky that if this is a bug then you found a very honorable forum member to have found it with.

Smiley
full member
Activity: 216
Merit: 100
It has come to my attention that this Simple Vanity Address Generator was the source of the address in question.

I assure you there is nothing intentionally malicious in the code, but it's one of the first Bitcoin applications I had written, and it could have bugs. In fact, I explain exactly that (and even warn against using it since it's closed source) on the page linked above.

I think what TheButterZone is doing here is honorable, and I want to do the right thing to. The generator is based on bitcoinj, and if there is any possibility of a collision attack the simple way I'm using it, this could be very important to the Bitcoin community (and bitcoinj developers). (EDIT: Although I think it's really unlikely.)

Give me a couple days (holidays) and I'll follow up.
legendary
Activity: 3472
Merit: 1722
Nice Christmas presents you got there, OP  Cool
legendary
Activity: 3472
Merit: 4794
. . . Still I don't believe this is a collision . . . Assuming the private key is randomly generated . . .
Exactly, assuming the private key was generated using an appropriately random seed.  Now, seeing as this is a Vanity Address, do we know what the source of randomness is for generating the keys?  If the particular Vanity Address generator used insufficiently random information to generate the key-pair, the chances of a collision could potentially be quite high.
legendary
Activity: 1666
Merit: 1000
Please go on with finding the right owner, with a minimum of effort, of course.

The owner is not necessarily the one that did the mistake. I think of payments from glbse or bitmarket.eu. Help to keep up trust in Bitcoins.
legendary
Activity: 2576
Merit: 1186
BTW: When people say chances of collision is low they don't mean 'low' as people use the word in normal everyday life. In reality the chances are infinitely small. The chance of Sol going supernova in the next microsecond is considerably larger then the chance of a collision ever occurring.
For a properly generated address, right. But this one came from a closed source vanity address generator of dubious design.
donator
Activity: 1218
Merit: 1079
Gerald Davis
Developers, is there any way to prevent collisions, so we don't have to put monitors on all our addresses?  Undecided

I am not a client developer but the simple answer is no.   Private keys are randomly generated and no client has a mechanism of knowing what other addresses have been created.  For example if you wanted to you could generate a private key by rolling a large number of dice and converting the results into a 256 bit number, then manually compute (using pen and a lot of paper) the public key and address.  It is simply impossible for a node to know what other random numbers in the world have been used.

Still I don't believe this is a collision, not without extensive evidence to the contrary. Assuming the private key is randomly generated, the odds of a collision are simple so incredibly low that they can be considered ~0% for all intents and purposes.

legendary
Activity: 2324
Merit: 1125
This is just like finding an envelope with money. In every jurisdiction I know of it's yours after:

1) You made a sincere attempt to find the owner (posting here and emptying the address to a temp address to get the attention of the owner suffices imo).
2) You have waited a fair amount of time (1 month in my jurisdiction iirc)

You seem to be really honest (it's Bitcoin, not much someone could do to take it from you) so I'm happy it was someone like you to receive this Smiley

BTW: When people say chances of collision is low they don't mean 'low' as people use the word in normal everyday life. In reality the chances are infinitely small. The chance of Sol going supernova in the next microsecond is considerably larger then the chance of a collision ever occurring.
vip
Activity: 1316
Merit: 1043
👻
If it was a mistake, it was repeated over and over and over again, which beggars belief to suppose it was a single paste. Do any exchanges let you enter a single withdrawal address that sticks until you change it? I know Gox makes me put in a new withdrawal address each time...

I'm seeking legal counsel at this point.
What do you mean?

1. You've posted on the forums. Wait for 3 months and see if anyone claims it.
2. If not, take the coins. Donate it if you're generous.
3. Feel good karma or feel profit Smiley
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
If it was a mistake, it was repeated over and over and over again, which beggars belief to suppose it was a single paste. Do any exchanges let you enter a single withdrawal address that sticks until you change it? I know Gox makes me put in a new withdrawal address each time...

I'm seeking legal counsel at this point.
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
it's not a collision.

someone made a mistake (accidentally entered the address somewhere, at an exchange for example. It can happen easily: have 1btc in clipboard for some reason, try to copy own address and fail, paste into mtgox, forget to double-check). That's the only plausible explanation I can come up with.

My take on what is the "right" thing to do: Wait (maybe 3 months, it's up to you). If someone shows up and can prove he owns the address, give him the money. Expect 10% or so in "finder's reward". If noone shows up, you can consider the money yours... you just won the lottery. It's up to you what to do with it, but if you want to build reputation by not keeping it for yourself consider helping some bitcoin-related project or starting your own. Don't give it as pittance to scam victims, that'd be just stupid and probably throwing money down the same hole. Put up a bounty for something cool you'd like to see done or whatever and don't let anyone else (including me) tell you what to do Wink

Does anyone know what our beloved law has to say about such a case (say someone accidentally mails you 4 ounces of gold, no sending address on the package). You're probably obligated to make reasonable effort to return it, I'm not sure. After that? I have no idea.
vip
Activity: 1316
Merit: 1043
👻
Maybe because it's Christmas?

Maybe someone won lessthan1 on satoshidice?

legendary
Activity: 1311
Merit: 1000
Free $7,000?

Lucky you.
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
Also, "the other day" I had said I use brainwallet.org saved to a USB key for offline use.
This doesn't actually make brain wallets safe.

I'm sure there are threads about this already, but I don't have A brain wallet, so this is OT.
legendary
Activity: 2576
Merit: 1186
Also, "the other day" I had said I use brainwallet.org saved to a USB key for offline use.
This doesn't actually make brain wallets safe.
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
There is a chance that someone has obtained the private key for 1tbzj and is using it for some reason. There is an extraordinarily small chance of a collision. You might move your own funds out just be safe.

I was considering that, now done. Part 2 would be to transfer the 519.704, now 519.70399999 because of the minimum trans fee to segregate the two amounts, to an offline wallet that I have secured against fire/flood/theft. Then if someone had a collision, they'll see "their" key emptied, and hopefully post in this forum that they suffered a theft (if they don't see this thread first), sign with MY key, and get their BTC back. Then I'll have to generate a new vanity address knowing 1tbzj is compromised.
Actually, is this the brain wallet you were talking about the other day? In that case, it's probably pretty likely that's what's going on here...

As covered in #bitcoin-otc after you posted this, no 1tbzj is not a brain wallet, it's a vanity. Also, "the other day" I had said I use brainwallet.org saved to a USB key for offline use. Not that I actually have a brainwallet and use the generator page to convert it to a private key.
legendary
Activity: 1223
Merit: 1006
legendary
Activity: 2576
Merit: 1186
There is a chance that someone has obtained the private key for 1tbzj and is using it for some reason. There is an extraordinarily small chance of a collision. You might move your own funds out just be safe.

I was considering that, now done. Part 2 would be to transfer the 519.704, now 519.70399999 because of the minimum trans fee to segregate the two amounts, to an offline wallet that I have secured against fire/flood/theft. Then if someone had a collision, they'll see "their" key emptied, and hopefully post in this forum that they suffered a theft (if they don't see this thread first), sign with MY key, and get their BTC back. Then I'll have to generate a new vanity address knowing 1tbzj is compromised.
Actually, is this the brain wallet you were talking about the other day? In that case, it's probably pretty likely that's what's going on here...
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
There is a chance that someone has obtained the private key for 1tbzj and is using it for some reason. There is an extraordinarily small chance of a collision. You might move your own funds out just be safe.

I was considering that, now done. Part 2 would be to transfer the 519.704, now 519.70399999 because of the minimum trans fee to segregate the two amounts, to an offline wallet that I have secured against fire/flood/theft. Then if someone had a collision, they'll see "their" key emptied, and hopefully post in this forum that they suffered a theft (if they don't see this thread first), sign with MY key, and get their BTC back. Then I'll have to generate a new vanity address knowing 1tbzj is compromised.
legendary
Activity: 4438
Merit: 3387
There is a chance that someone has obtained the private key for 1tbzj and is using it for some reason. There is an extraordinarily small chance of a collision. You might move your own funds out just be safe.

But most likely someone is just sending them to the wrong address by mistake. It's fairly easy to make that mistake.

Maybe that email about transferring money for some Nigerian prince was actually true!


hero member
Activity: 952
Merit: 1009
That's a lot of butter.
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
And another 300 it seems: http://blockchain.info/tx/3d2c9e562de4de64cb57eb69623bfa144af24676e96cb6b446b3e26bffb6abb7

I draw my hat, TheButterZone, for wanting to return it.

Just got the email notification from bitcoinmonitor.net about that one first thing this morning. /facepalm

Edited the OP with that added and some more info.
zaj
member
Activity: 103
Merit: 10
donate them to pirate's scam victims :') you will be forever known as a hero in bitcoinland! Cheesy
legendary
Activity: 3472
Merit: 4794

In this case: BTC 0.03 is a tip, BTC 300 is an accident.

Interesting. So the difference between a tip/donation and an accident is determined by the amount?

So, at what it the transition amount?

Is 0.1 BTC a tip or donation?
0.5 BTC?
1.0 BTC?
5 BTC?
10 BTC?
50 BTC?
100 BTC?

Is the transition point a well understood amount that most of society agrees on, or just your personal feelings on the matter?  If it is just your personal feelings on the matter, then it seems rather arbitrary and error prone.  If someone else uses a different transition point, is one of you a thief?  Is the other paranoid and failing to use money that was intended for your use?
sr. member
Activity: 306
Merit: 250
Donations: http://tny.im/nx
. . . Now 200 BTC more from who the hell knows . . .
I'd just hang on to it for a bit.  Maybe send it off to a paper wallet to avoid accidentally spending it.

At over 200 BTC, my guess is that someone is going to realize what they've accidentally done, and start searching for the person who owns 1tbzj.  There is probably going to be a post in the Newbie forum some time in the next few days (weeks?) asking, "How do I get back BTC that I accidentally sent to the wrong address!!!?"  Someone will teach them how to sign messages, and then send them over to this thread.

I'm not sure how long is a reasonable amount of time to keep track of BTC that were sent to you unsolicited.  At what point should a person decide that it is a donation (or tip) instead of an accident?

From my point of view a true newbie never has that much money to send accidentally... someone who has 200 BTC should probably know enough about Bitcoin to know what to do, or else I'd say it's an early adopter which forgot about the project for some years and is coming back now (and in that case, from where did the person in question get the wrong address to send to?).

Is there any chance there's someone sending money to OP's address, with the intention of sending to another address with the same/similar firstbits?
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
If you provide a "tip" or "donation" address, and people anonymously send you tips/donations, how do you determine the difference between "tips/donations" which you are intended to spend, and "accidents" that you should hold on to for 100+ years?

In this case: BTC 0.03 is a tip, BTC 300 is an accident.
sr. member
Activity: 317
Merit: 1012
I know whats going on here, you've sent them to yourself to get some serious rep before doing some dirty deeds and changing your name to ThePirateZone Wink

Seriously though, big thumbs up for posting it. Its a fairly big amount to just have sitting there, imho a month in cold storage and if no one has claimed it by then I'd use it as investment capital in something that can be cashed in within a few weeks should the rightful owner turn up.

EDIT: Oops, got names mixed up, sry.
donator
Activity: 2772
Merit: 1019
legendary
Activity: 3472
Merit: 4794
. . . Now 200 BTC more from who the hell knows . . .
At what point should a person decide that it is a donation (or tip) instead of an accident?

i would say time has nothing to do with it, if this guy comes back and requests repayment in a 100 years its no less relivent than today. I would personally never spend it unless i become desperate someday and had no other way to put food on the table.
If you provide a "tip" or "donation" address, and people anonymously send you tips/donations, how do you determine the difference between "tips/donations" which you are intended to spend, and "accidents" that you should hold on to for 100+ years?

. . . It's also a donation address . . .
legendary
Activity: 1722
Merit: 1217
. . . Now 200 BTC more from who the hell knows . . .
At what point should a person decide that it is a donation (or tip) instead of an accident?

i would say time has nothing to do with it, if this guy comes back and requests repayment in a 100 years its no less relivent than today. I would personally never spend it unless i become desperate someday and had no other way to put food on the table.
legendary
Activity: 3472
Merit: 4794
. . . Now 200 BTC more from who the hell knows . . .
I'd just hang on to it for a bit.  Maybe send it off to a paper wallet to avoid accidentally spending it.

At over 200 BTC, my guess is that someone is going to realize what they've accidentally done, and start searching for the person who owns 1tbzj.  There is probably going to be a post in the Newbie forum some time in the next few days (weeks?) asking, "How do I get back BTC that I accidentally sent to the wrong address!!!?"  Someone will teach them how to sign messages, and then send them over to this thread.

I'm not sure how long is a reasonable amount of time to keep track of BTC that were sent to you unsolicited.  At what point should a person decide that it is a donation (or tip) instead of an accident?
legendary
Activity: 2646
Merit: 1137
All paid signature campaigns should be banned.
Did James at GLBSE screw up again and send out BTC to the wrong addresses?
newbie
Activity: 30
Merit: 0
Strange stuff. I checked and it's definitely not coming from bittracks.
hero member
Activity: 900
Merit: 1014
advocate of a cryptographic attack on the globe
So you are giving back 2000+ dollars to the owner?

My hat off to you sir !

Yes! +1.
hero member
Activity: 699
Merit: 500
Your Minion
Give it 30-90 days and if no claimer donate it to various charities.
legendary
Activity: 1890
Merit: 1086
Ian Knowles - CIYAM Lead Developer
Well... If no one wants the money back we might as well share it evenly between the first posters on this thread... just saying Tongue

Now that made me laugh - merry xmas Luke and I do hope the OP is able to return the funds to the rightful owner.
legendary
Activity: 2576
Merit: 1186
...post Tongue

Is it that you don't like using Watch or that you wanted us to know that you are?

Smiley

Well... If no one wants the money back we might as well share it evenly between the first posters on this thread... just saying Tongue
hero member
Activity: 882
Merit: 1006
Damn, somebody really liked your posts.
legendary
Activity: 1890
Merit: 1086
Ian Knowles - CIYAM Lead Developer
...post Tongue

Is it that you don't like using Watch or that you wanted us to know that you are?

Smiley
member
Activity: 60
Merit: 10
Maybe GLBSE / pirate / whatever refunds?
hero member
Activity: 868
Merit: 1000
Somebody got goxed? It was probably just a glox (read: glitch).


Sorry, just felt the need to be funny!
legendary
Activity: 2576
Merit: 1186
full member
Activity: 210
Merit: 100
Well... If no one wants the money back we might as well share it evenly between the first posters on this thread... just saying Tongue

Maybe someone gave you a donation, added your address to his contact list and then mistook it for another recipient he wanted to send the money too in the first place.
legendary
Activity: 1638
Merit: 1001
₪``Campaign Manager´´₪
So you are giving back 2000+ dollars to the owner?

My hat off to you sir !
legendary
Activity: 3038
Merit: 1032
RIP Mommy
White Paper discussion here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/white-paper-receipt-of-btc-from-unknown-person-155112

http://blockchain.info/address/1aM9FxKHzqNZfnnBvv7BgZ6PSzaN7zfNQ is the sender. Untagged, not found with Google. See the timestamps? 20 seconds or less after receiving each of those amounts from a variety of addresses, they were swept to mine. I don't have the knowhow to sweep, nor do I use a client, so this is very weird.

I haven't had any contact from anyone wanting to buy my stuff or services. I have 1tbzj as a payment address for a track at bittracks.com, but it's previously come in single-sale increments, with a percentage fee taken out every time, not in large chunks. I've emailed the owner just in case. ETA: Nope, not that. 1tbzj is also my referral address for Instawire (1%) and bitcoinvanity.appspot.com (20%), but those amounts would equal some pretty expensive transactions that I referred. It's also a donation address, but who would sweep large (for me) donations to any address like this?

If you can sign a message with the private key for 1aM9FxKHzqNZfnnBvv7BgZ6PSzaN7zfNQ, I can verify it belongs to 1aM9FxKHzqNZfnnBvv7BgZ6PSzaN7zfNQ (if you know how signing works, you know that I never see your private key). If you can prove it's yours, let me know what's up with your transactions.
See Penultimate ETA below...

http://blockchain.info/tx/064266858fbb1392041a3c605e526dcf406ab8c0a43187764e31ba7b75bc3093
http://blockchain.info/tx/57fe9d49aba3b922f347dd4a79331bf6a43b134a4effad8d495f5f5ac42481c7
http://blockchain.info/tx/9c43e57abf364d0ba68b882f27d79dbf4230a41bb27c61e0f6ccd4e679d0a8b6

ETA: Now 200 BTC more from who the hell knows... http://blockchain.info/tx/92d3c868acdcaf25bb8b7fa85fe5e2035ee8af0e600159ae4b3d1a11035d7ae8

ETA again: Now 300 BTC more from who the frak knows.... http://blockchain.info/tx/3d2c9e562de4de64cb57eb69623bfa144af24676e96cb6b446b3e26bffb6abb7

I'm so cynical I think this can't be an accident. The first 3 sweeps, maybe. Are major hacked or otherwise stolen coins getting sent to me to frame me up as a thief, accomplice, or receiver of stolen coins? (I couldn't afford to buy this many BTC without charging my credit card, and there's no guarantee I wouldn't be doing minimum payments for months, years even) Well, as long as this topic stays up and I have a screenshot of my OP, fuck that, fuck you, if that's the case.

I was never an investor in Pirate, GLBSE, or any investment at all. Same for Bitcoinica and Bitmarket, no BTC ever held there. The only BTC I ever lost were <2 BTC (yes, less than two BTC) on Bitfloor from its hack, and a small percentage of that has been paid back.

Penultimate ETA, I hope: As I planned in this post, the 519.70399999 (after the ridiculously low, 1 satoshi tx fee) has been moved to the paper wallet http://blockchain.info/address/1D58NtxrZF4iUnGAFojnqNpPuGi9rrcyVf . I am operating under the conclusion (even if mistaken) that 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp had a collision and somebody/somecomputer didn't realize (or care) that it was already in use. SO, if you also have the private key for 1TBZjmXho6mdGhoESaMV2svtqJXYtWfEp, sign with it and I will verify it matches mine, then send your BTC to the new address of your choosing.

Developers, is there any way to prevent collisions, so we don't have to put monitors on all our addresses?  Undecided
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