They were clearly biding their time and waiting for a busy news day in order to do this without it getting too much attention. “I’d say I’m 50/50 right now, perhaps leaning towards a Silk Roader. As for whether it was an insider or a hacker, his guess it’s as likely either way. “Either way, the funds are now on the move, and whoever now controls the bitcoins may want to cash them out,” Robinson said. What is unusual here is that an encrypted wallet file for this address has apparently become available. “Note that you can’t do this with any old bitcoin address. This is computationally feasible if the password is short enough,” Robinson said. ![]() “It is likely that it was ‘brute-forced’, ie all possible passwords were tried. Using the world’s fastest supercomputer to try every combination would take as many times more than the age of the universe as there have been seconds since the Big Bang.īut if the actual wallet file leaks, then the task is much simpler because it only involves guessing the password that protects the private key. Simply guessing the private key of a bitcoin wallet is functionally impossible. The black market Web site known as the Silk Road emerges. A file that some claimed was an encrypted bitcoin wallet containing the keys to the funds has been circulated in cryptocurrency communities for the past year, and – if it is what it was claimed to be – then a combination of brute computing power and good luck could have successfully decrypted the wallet. Stream Silk Road: Drugs, Death and the Dark Web online, episodes and seasons, online with DIRECTV. One possibility is that an individual or group has managed to “crack” the wallet, effectively guessing its password and stealing the funds. “However, it seems unlikely that Ulbricht would be able to conduct a bitcoin transaction from prison.” “The movement of these bitcoins today, now worth around $955m, may represent Ulbricht or a Silk Road vendor moving their funds,” he said. Robinson says it is unclear who moved the money. The FBI managed to seize 174,000 bitcoins, then worth about $100m, but an estimated 450,000 earned by the marketplace remain unaccounted for. Previously, the Silk Road was the most popular darknet market, created by Ross Ulbricht, AKA Dread Pirate Roberts. But all use cryptocurrency to purchase, and all are delivered to your door. ![]() After the marketplace was shut down in late 2013, its founder and boss, 36-year-old San Franciscan Ross Ulbricht, was sentenced to a double life sentence plus 40 years without possibility of parole. Darknet markets supply all manner of goods. “They left the Silk Road’s wallet back on when they were worth around $350,000 and then remained dormant for nearly a year, before being moved … in April 2013.”įrom there, the funds have lain dormant. “Through blockchain analysis we can determine that these funds likely originated from the Silk Road,” said Tom Robinson, chief scientist at the cryptocurrency analysts Elliptic. Late on Tuesday night, however, the full amount less a $12 (£9) transaction fee was transferred to a new bitcoin address, records show.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |