Topic: [Payout Updates] Bitcoinica site is taken offline for security investigation - page 14. (Read 156711 times)

My version of the story is, Tihan selected a password from one of the Mt. Gox API keys and we face-to-face agreed to use that. There was no plan to release the source code ever (and if I did it myself, I would at least remove the credentials). The password has never been changed for 5 months, despite the transfer of ownership.

I didn't expect to be able to log in to LastPass after Bitcoinica Consultancy took over. So I didn't try.

He had the critical password, apparently. So while he might be able to wash his hands of responsibility for money-laundering going through his pipelines he remains a prime suspect in the theft. He could have insisted that password be changed had he wanted to wash his hands of that.

-MarkM-

This should have been put into the hands of a liquidator and a police report filed months ago.  But...Bitcoin isn't an excuse - computer intrusions which delete or otherwise damage critical data are illegal in and of themselves and liquidators are perfectly capable of selling assets to pay creditors (after having first secured the assets).  The only real question is what entity should have filed for insolvency, and that's not clear even now. 

This whole process should be turned over to a liquidator/administrator now - it's the only way there's going to be a thorough and transparent accounting of the remaining assets and a public examination of what happened in the months leading up to the insolvency.  NZ insolvency law allows for a liquidator to apply to have their fees paid out of a fund specifically set aside for that purpose so that creditors are not unfairly disadvantaged by liquidator fees.

It is absurd that law enforcement is not being involved in investigating these thefts.  There's no financial institution or company which would not report such large thefts to law enforcement even if they chose not to make those losses public.  The "let's just put it behind us and move forward" attitude only encourages more attempts at theft.  People have been prosecuted for stealing virtual furniture on Habbo Hotel, FFS.  Anonymous members were prosecuted for the HB Gary intrusion (no data or funds were lost).  And yet Bitcoin businesses remain reluctant to involve law enforcement even when intrusions cause a significant loss of user funds.  Why the hell wouldn't you want to see someone prosecuted for those thefts?

Hand the claims process over to a liquidator and the investigation process over to law enforcement - it's the only way that either has a chance of being done competently.

FWIW, I do believe that Amir, Patrick and Donald probably didn't know what they were getting into.  A month simply isn't enough time to do adequate due diligence when you're setting up multiple entities which have varying degrees of liability and the nominal owners are not actually running the business (the reason Tihan keeps repeating that his role was hands off is because he'd lose safe harbour protection from liability if he took part in the day to day running of the company).

Catching up due to a prompt from BadBitcoin, but wanted to note Vladimir's point above.  While their terms of service might state protection against negligence, "gross negligence" is not usually able to be contracted out.  Could be a case to lump these guys together.

poll about scammer tag: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/scammer-tag-bitoinica-93119 , please vote.

I don't know Patrick or Donald at all, and I even do not know Amir at all, but Amir's history in posts, interviews or anything wich is to find in the net don't draw a picture of a criminal mind at all.
This does not mean that in the case of Patrick or Donald i can say worse, but only theres ist not an as clear picture to draw about them than in Amir's case.

I really can't imagine that they all together or one of them alone planned something like this, if so they or the one person failed here too. That pile of shit that now hits the fan really can't have been the intention of them...

I just assume they totally are not in control of the situation, they probable are not same minded or don' had a good communication, and as for seen they don't pull in the same direction...

maybe at one time you were the victims too, but you don't have to be suprised if all the other victims here claim you as the criminals now due to be so scariyfing ineffiecient and underskilled to even secure the remaining funds after the first hack early day in May...

in an earlier post i said this:


Now I think this would have been one of the best ways to solve the problem at all, though it would have been painfully for you... to fund this it maybe would have been neccasary to require a new partner at intersango, but how will you run intersango in the future when some of the victims will draw you to courts, I don't know what the establishment in form of Judges an lawers will decide...but probably they are not your natural friends at all...

Yeah, patrick walks away and another pile of money is stolen.

It's not even plausible anymore, guys. You're just brazenly stealing our money, and rubbing that in our faces.

I hope Patrick finally gets the jail cell he deserves. Maybe his cellie will give him the respect he so desperately wants.

Maybe we need a "hacked" counter tag instead.

So long for "never compromised", huh?

The bad news is already here: https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/bitcoinica-mtgox-account-compromised-93074

Another 350K USD stolen from their MtGox account. Patrick has walked away.

Here's what I don't understand.

phantomcircuit believes that there are exactly zero other qualified people to process transactions at intersango (this is what he told me - no one else can or will put the attention to detail as he will. Anyone else would make a mess of things. He told me (and in this thread,  all of us) the same about the bitcoinica money.

The problem is, that the work doesn't get done unless phantomcircuit does it.

When you're not going to get your work done, you MUST delegate.

People with control issues immediate state the above paragraph when told their process(es) are too slow and they must delegate.

If you can't delegate, it's because you're having serious control issues. Out of some 7Billion people on earth, it is simply NOT TRUE that phantomcircuit is the only person who could achieve this.

phantomcircuit, you have a SERIOUS control issue. You need to go away,. You are the biggest problem in this process. We'd be better off with the NZ government getting our money back to us. If you don't have control issues, then you're trying to hide something from us, and probably the rest of your team. What are you hiding?  

At least the go government isn't going to play the obvious favorites game phantomcircuit is. (I'm sure this post will delay my payment even further, because, yes, friendly people have gotten their money back, while others who piss him off, have not, and likely will not. He will fuck the rest of you by giving it to the government just before you thought you'd get your money) Just watch. I await the "bad news"

Yeah. This is worse than a scam. But at least we KNOW who;'s in charge of it - he won't let anyone else be. phantomcircuit, you deserve to work at walmart. I hear they're always in need of (front door) security. It's right up your alley. And, matches your qualifications.

On second thought - walmart will rightfully fire your ass when you demand "some fucking respect"  We should fire your ass for that too.

Seriously - do us all a favor and GET OUT OF THE FUCKING WAY - You're the reason we haven't received our money.

I wish Zhou had been allowed to deal with this. I would have gotten my money MONTHS ago.

hell, phantomcircuit wouldn't even tell me IF he'd returned my money when he requested I "lol remove the rating" I gave him on OTC. He ignored gmaxwell repeating the question. IMO, this signified that he had zero intention of returning my money to me.

If you won't answer a simple question like that, just like all the questions about the ownership that you've refused to answer, and basically any question of significance about this issue - I know you're not telling me the truth about everything. I know you are LYING ABOUT SOMETHING. I just don't know for sure about what. I hope we find out. I hope that we find out when the government(s) get involved and discover the crimes that have been committed.

I know that government involvement won't help me get my money back, and may prevent it - but making sure that these guys can't pull this (incompetent? criminal?) shit again is paramount. They must not be allowed to separate more people from their hard earned money.

This should have been turned over to professionals long ago. Now that phantomcircuit's friends have been paid, I'm sure he's going to say "fuck it" and drop the rest and turn it over to the government. That'll make sure he get what he wants without violating the letter of the law.

It's worth the $500 I've apparently spent to help expose this incompetency, and criminal desire (if not criminal behavior). I'm sure now I'll never see that.

Oh - WAIT...Here's the predictable bad news. THE MONEY IS NOW GONE.

Yep - you guys a fucking criminals. Thieves. Period. NO ONE IS THIS FUCKING STUPID.

Feel free to start a thread in trading discussion and compile all the evidence and people involved into one post. Or just post and bitch about it I guess. 

...
no comments

IANAL. But in UK this potentially could be classified as "gross negligence" and this can be used to pierce the veil of limited liability. Absence of timely police report would be a major blow to any attempt to defend this. The fact that the company structure was established so sloppily and immediately before "money evaporation" does not help at all either.

I do think that if this matter gets to courts the limited liability would be pierced and in eyes of the law the individuals behind core whatever and whatever consultancy would be held liable personally. The strategy would be to sue the individuals involved in UK and persuade the court to declare all the silly offshore stuff they came up with as sham, use all the financial promotion laws, get FSA and Financial Ombudsman to investigate them etc... (whatever could work). It might even be possible to attack Bitcoin Consultancy and argue that this is effectively the same company as Bitcoinica Consultancy (the same biz, the same people involved). This is all such a mess and the companies involved are potentially so vulnerable because of skimming (maybe) on the edge of unlawful trading due to multitude of various financial regulation that a good lawyer would likely be able to come up with a very strong case.

If I had significant amount of open bullish bets there I myself would definitely go on legal offensive by now big time and fight for refund of both original deposits, unrealised gains and legal fees. The discovery process would also  be very interesting here.

Moreover, if by some miracle in 10 month time one BTC worth 100$ the amounts at stake would suddenly warrant use of the best lawyers there are.

But I do not have that much money there just about 1000$ of Dialcoin/Bitcoin Magazine funds, which are basically written off by now. So I'll chill.

The last person to post in this thread will forever be known as the last person who ever posted in this thread.

I believe a compilemint was conducted of the parties on this train wreck, albeit shot--also true of the facts--and shot, as in the Magic Short Bus that's taking us all for a ride.

I just started reading the other thread, and had to switch accounts to reply to something I read in the OP. Upon the switch, I noticed a new post here and opted to reply to it and add my comment here from for fear of it may already be addressed there and didn't want to get the proverbial cart before the broken-down alpaca.

Let me see if I have this right. A hacker is able to get funds out of Mt Gox faster than anybody on Earth using only a compromised password.

This went from 100%, everybody will get their money back, to 50% at a time, and now with the latest hack, a possible only 30% total will be returned. This has gone from Bitcoinica's Got Talent to Lost. I say it's about time for Wendon to reappear and have some other password compromised so we get this bitch's payout down to only 3.14159265%--a nice round number.

Full disclosure: I didn't have one Satoshi in Bitcoinica, but long story short, I've indirectly lost/losing tens of thousands of dollars due to this cluster-fuck (perhaps maybe it's why, subconsciously, I created Al to maintain my good-natureness and sanity) due to the fact that I'd turned one guy onto Bitcoin and he took it upon himself to invest in Bitcoinica, doing so with my blessing as possibly his only due diligence. I'm sure he'll be happy to read that he may only get 30% of his money back once he reads that in the new thread. I'm not sure what he had tied up in Bitcoinica, but it was substantial, but in no way will any lost hurt his financial well-being. But thanks to the body of people he hangs with here in Sandwich, Illinois, I now have begun to feel  the blunt force of this fiasco. I've had to close two of my warehouses down due to some new law (was aware it existed and knew I was not compliant but operated under the radar until...best stop here and keep it vague, but will and have PM details).

Done for now. Back to reading the other thread.

~Bruno~

thank you for repeat the second part of my post in a way a native speaker would understand better

Not necessarily. There is also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Criminal_negligence . And the way this was handled shows an incredible lack of foresight. Why TF did Tihan have access to the Gox account? Surely that's not because Patrick and Genjix wanted it that way! It could be then argued that Tihan as well as whoever insisted on Tihan having access are criminally negligent.

if they would have filed a police report i would agree (past; i am speaking about the first break in).

but atm we have no chance to know who stole it. could be Tihan itself afterall.
all we know is they owe us money and tell us stories why it is so difficult to pay it back and that they are doing it for charity.

^^ sounds like a typicall scammer.

I dont think they deserve a scammer tag, but some stupidity tag.
 

i am thinking about a scammer tag too.

BUT: after all they are a LP. i think this means that if the company don't have the funds they are not legally obeyed to pay out.

in germany if someone is a "security expert" (justice defines this term) and do very obvious failures in securing the money they are personally liable (or must go to jail).

i dont know NZ/UK laws and i dont know the policy of this forum.

personally i think they all deserve a scammer tag now.

Yeah they should have been tagged long ago...

btw: Did anyone already compile a list of the persons involved in this scam and the most important facts?