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Topic: Bitfinex Seeks Communication With Bitcoin Thief - page 2. (Read 1753 times)

legendary
Activity: 1176
Merit: 1017
Well, the whole thing's fishy and if the thief returned the funds, then that would make it even fishier.  The whole thing just makes me wonder how these things are carried off in the first place.  The best thing that will come out of this is a new consumer awareness of personal security and the need for more transparent security audits before committing one's resources to a centralized platform.
legendary
Activity: 1680
Merit: 1010
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On August 2nd the Hong Kong-based Bitcoin exchange Bitfinex was compromised for roughly $70 million worth of Bitcoin. According to sources, the attacker managed to drain the exchange through its multi-signature security — gaining 120,000 BTC from the breach. Now the exchange is trying to reach out to the responsible party in an attempt to get its customers’ Bitcoin returned.

https://news.bitcoin.com/bitfinex-seeks-bitcoin-thief/

I dont think there will be any communication whatsoever. why would he communicate? If he does it may be easier to get caught...
legendary
Activity: 2436
Merit: 1561
This is strange I can't understand Bitfinex owners,do they really expect from the hacker to show and communicate with them and then return the stolen funds?
This is never going to happen,Im sure that he has already mixed these coins,exchanged them into fiat and now enjoys a luxury life.

Well, it did work for BTER, after negotiations they got 85% of stolen NXT back from the hacker:
https://cointelegraph.com/news/exclusive-key-negotiator-in-bter-nxt-hack-speaks-out

If the story is true (could've been as well an inside job), then it was definitely worth it.


legendary
Activity: 1484
Merit: 1001
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I am not sure about the full story but I do hope that Bitfinex will be able to contact the team that is responsible for the hack. I really hope that the hackers will consider returning those Bitcoin to its original owners and explain how they manage to bypass Bitfinex's security. This can make Bitcoin stronger which is something that I believe every good Bitcoiners and tech-savvy people (like those hackers) wants.

On August 2nd the Hong Kong-based Bitcoin exchange Bitfinex was compromised for roughly $70 million worth of Bitcoin. According to sources, the attacker managed to drain the exchange through its multi-signature security — gaining 120,000 BTC from the breach. Now the exchange is trying to reach out to the responsible party in an attempt to get its customers’ Bitcoin returned.

https://news.bitcoin.com/bitfinex-seeks-bitcoin-thief/

The question is if bitfinex itself was the mastermind in the hacking. First and foremost bitfinex is a large company and has the capability of spending millions to investigate using very highly skilled programmers. It is just an opinion but I do hope bitfinex is guilt free and will be successful taking back the coins. Whether it inside job or done by outside hacker the bitcoin is impossible to retrieve.

I really doubt that it is an inside job though. I cannot understand why Bitfinex would want to do this if they already have enough profit from trading fees.
hero member
Activity: 994
Merit: 544
On August 2nd the Hong Kong-based Bitcoin exchange Bitfinex was compromised for roughly $70 million worth of Bitcoin. According to sources, the attacker managed to drain the exchange through its multi-signature security — gaining 120,000 BTC from the breach. Now the exchange is trying to reach out to the responsible party in an attempt to get its customers’ Bitcoin returned.

https://news.bitcoin.com/bitfinex-seeks-bitcoin-thief/

The question is if bitfinex itself was the mastermind in the hacking. First and foremost bitfinex is a large company and has the capability of spending millions to investigate using very highly skilled programmers. It is just an opinion but I do hope bitfinex is guilt free and will be successful taking back the coins. Whether it inside job or done by outside hacker the bitcoin is impossible to retrieve.
legendary
Activity: 2898
Merit: 1823
It seems to be a desperate attempt by Bitfinex to get at least part of the funds back. But I doubt it will work, because the hacker would have to trust Bitfinex that he is not exposed to risk of identification. Even if Bitfinex enters a deal with the hacker this won't stop the ongoing investigations by law enforcement.
But first of all it's questionable in the first place that the hacker has any motivation to make a deal, because he may have already washed all his coins and has zero problems spending them.

The whole announcement might even be a red herring, assuming that the alleged "hack" was an inside job by the Bitfinex operators...

ya.ya.yo!

If the hack was not an inside job then this should be viewed as a desperate last effort for Bitfinex to recover the stolen funds. This means that they might be having financial and liquidity/cash flow problems and the exchange might even shut down in the near future. It would also mean that there might be a group of whales in the exchange who might press charges if they do not get their Bitcoins back in full.

If the hacker does not communicate with Bitfinex then I would expect a bad press release from them in 2 or 3 months.

legendary
Activity: 4410
Merit: 4766
now the divorce is over he if secretly holding the coins but trying to gain fiat from outside investors via
https://bnktothefuture.com/pitches/bitfinex

that way he can keep the coins and off load the debt to VC's.

Then the affected users have every right to get the authorities involved. People with criminal minds should not be allowed to get away with their exploits.

they have the right to. but technically they have been baited and switched.
by now having *cough* equity *cough* in bitfinex, they are now part of it. thus by reporting it. their own "equity" would get locked and then put into a government pot that gets eaten up by lawyers for a couple years.

its a smart thing. make users scared to lose out on something twice, if they take legal action.

so now they have to follow the carrot (hoping bitfinex pays them back), because the stick (legal action) loses them more.

afterall. its been a couple years.. how many mtgox customers have got anything at all back. but how many lawyers have got a nice christmas bonus
copper member
Activity: 2996
Merit: 2374
But I doubt it will work, because the hacker would have to trust Bitfinex that he is not exposed to risk of identification.
Bitfinex has proposed ways to communicate with that hacker that should not expose the hacker's identity:
But first of all it's questionable in the first place that the hacker has any motivation to make a deal, because he may have already washed all his coins and has zero problems spending them.
The hacker stole roughly 119,000 BTC. The only mixer that has been around a long time without claims of theft is bitmixer, who claims to be able to handle a maximum of ~2,500BTC, however they could only handle this one time because if the hacker were to mix 2,500BTC twice then he would simply get coins associated with what he originally sent them.

Even if you use a mixer, your coins can potentially be traced, especially if large amounts are involved via advanced blockchain analysis. Some blockchain analysis companies apparently know a portion of the various mixer's addresses.

A deal would likely be something along the lines of the hacker returning 1,000 BTC to bitfinex, then bitfinex sends the hacker 100 BTC (or whatever agreed upon amount)worth of XMR (or some other untraceable altcoin), the hacker sells said XMR on an exchange and the process is repeated 119 times.

sr. member
Activity: 854
Merit: 250
This is strange I can't understand Bitfinex owners,do they really expect from the hacker to show and communicate with them and then return the stolen funds?
This is never going to happen,Im sure that he has already mixed these coins,exchanged them into fiat and now enjoys a luxury life.
legendary
Activity: 1148
Merit: 1000
Ok I'm not accusing anyone and I'm not a coding expert but I've been wondering about this ever since they got hacked. And it's not really specific to Bitfinex either, I'm curious as to whether something like this would be theoretically possible: What if this multi signature security 'flaw' was purposefully baked into the design from the beginning, basically a calculated long term scam, and they were just waiting for the right time to trigger it? Could someone pull off a stunt like this?
mk4
legendary
Activity: 2870
Merit: 3873
Paldo.io 🤖
I don't see this working. Pretty much Bitfinex is offering the hacker a way-smaller bounty in exchange for the bitcoins that have been stolen?

Ofcourse the hacker wouldn't want that. Not to mention, the hacker risks a small chance of getting caught (depending on how good his/her OPSEC is).
full member
Activity: 225
Merit: 100
losing 120,000 bitcoin is just awful ,if they are holding this much value they should have spend some money on security audition from time to time that could have saved them ,if you want to cut down your budget you must expect these kind of hacks,why would they hold this much coin their wallet,just amateur stuff from the team,you can request the people behind the hack to come forward for a reward when they are holding millions worth of coins .awesome try
legendary
Activity: 1218
Merit: 1007
On August 2nd the Hong Kong-based Bitcoin exchange Bitfinex was compromised for roughly $70 million worth of Bitcoin. According to sources, the attacker managed to drain the exchange through its multi-signature security — gaining 120,000 BTC from the breach. Now the exchange is trying to reach out to the responsible party in an attempt to get its customers’ Bitcoin returned.

https://news.bitcoin.com/bitfinex-seeks-bitcoin-thief/
It really seems impossible for them to ever make contact with the guy, and chances are they never will. We're going to at best see a minor statement regarding this in the future, but it will never come from the hacker himself. Chances are that guy is long-gone and they aren't going to be finding him anytime soon, unless he gets cocky and exposes himself either online or in real life. It might just be a waiting game.
legendary
Activity: 2240
Merit: 1069
It is doubtful that the hacker will bite this. Even if bitfinex offers a secure channel for them to communicate, they will still risk exposing themselves. Any sound mind will not take that risk, especially if you already have $70 million in your lap.
member
Activity: 81
Merit: 10
haha, this is pretty funny.
it is as if they are talking in front of a mirror because i bet there were no hack ever, and they did all of that themselves. 70 million dollar is not a small amount after all.
legendary
Activity: 1386
Merit: 1020
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This is strange. I mean talking to the person who robbed you, literaly. What would be the point, asking to pay the stolen money back? I don't think this would work. And if the company is comunicating with this person then they now who this person is, or at least they have some of the data. Why don't they reveal that to the police or something?

Its really a strange thing for  bitfinex owners  trying to contact  to the  person  who hacked on their  website. Im thinking that they  would try to convince  to return  back the  money that have been stolen but still it would  be  useless at all and  no  one  hacker  would able  to do that  hence  thats a lot of money already.
legendary
Activity: 2898
Merit: 1823
they robbed themselves and are just doing PR to keep up the pretense that it was an outside job.
the owner was going through a divorce and suddenly had to make lots of funds disapear to ensure he doesnt have to give 50% to his now ex.

That is a very interesting turn of events. But before knowing that the owner was going through a divorce, many of us from the community have already been thinking that an inside job is very much possible considering that they were using multi-sigs and other security measures. Only a person who has inside knowledge and access would be able to touch those Bitcoins.

Quote
now the divorce is over he if secretly holding the coins but trying to gain fiat from outside investors via
https://bnktothefuture.com/pitches/bitfinex

that way he can keep the coins and off load the debt to VC's.

Then the affected users have every right to get the authorities involved. People with criminal minds should not be allowed to get away with their exploits.
legendary
Activity: 4410
Merit: 4766
they robbed themselves and are just doing PR to keep up the pretense that it was an outside job.
the owner was going through a divorce and suddenly had to make lots of funds disapear to ensure he doesnt have to give 50% to his now ex.

now the divorce is over he if secretly holding the coins but trying to gain fiat from outside investors via
https://bnktothefuture.com/pitches/bitfinex

that way he can keep the coins and off load the debt to VC's.
legendary
Activity: 2912
Merit: 1068
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This is strange. I mean talking to the person who robbed you, literaly. What would be the point, asking to pay the stolen money back? I don't think this would work. And if the company is comunicating with this person then they now who this person is, or at least they have some of the data. Why don't they reveal that to the police or something?
legendary
Activity: 1904
Merit: 1074
I would be very suspicious if a company I hacked, tried to communicate with me. The guy or the group already got away with it, and most

of that money are already pushed through the system, so it is probably too late. They might know something about this hacker, and wants

to use that information as leverage without exposing him/her in public and gaining favour to get some of the money ??...Well Whatever

works, if they succeed ...it would be a bonus for the victims.  Wink
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