How Did Dread Pirate Roberts Acquire and Protect His Bitcoin Wealth? [pdf]

On page 12: "For some reason (mistake? a tracking attempt?) the account received a tiny amount of 1 Satoshi [...] almost a year later on July 23-rd 2012. Its owner noticed this non-zero balance one year later, and emptied it once more on August 6-th 2013. On September 11-th 2013 he received another tiny transfer of 0.0000091, and on November 18-th 2013 yet another one of 0.00011. On November 20-th he sends the 0.0000091 but the 0.00011 is still there."

Could these be rewards for transaction confirmations? (Probably not since it's not suggested in the paper, and they're the experts and I'm not).

Re: How Did Dread Pirate Roberts Acquire and Protect His Bitcoin Wealth? [pdf]

#8

Post by ok_craig » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 8:48 AM UTC

Two really interesting things to me are (1) that it's now possible to have hundreds of millions of dollars worth of assets and not have them seized when arrested; and (2) there's a lot of speculation that bitcoin was created by a government entity and that that's who Satoshi is - what are the implications of that entity funding DPR?

Re: How Did Dread Pirate Roberts Acquire and Protect His Bitcoin Wealth? [pdf]

#9

Post by Swizec » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 8:48 AM UTC

Roberts had grown so rich, he wanted to retire. He took me to his cabin and he told me his secret. 'I am not the Dread Pirate Roberts' he said. 'My name is Ryan; I inherited the ship from the previous Dread Pirate Roberts, just as you will inherit it from me. The man I inherited it from is not the real Dread Pirate Roberts either. His name was Cummerbund. The real Roberts has been retired 15 years and living like a king in Patagonia.'

Re: How Did Dread Pirate Roberts Acquire and Protect His Bitcoin Wealth? [pdf]

#10

Post by TwoBit » Mon, Nov 25, 2013, 8:52 AM UTC

ok_craig wrote: post #8

Two really interesting things to me are (1) that it's now possible to have hundreds of millions of dollars worth of assets and not have them seized when arrested; and (2) there's a lot of speculation that bitcoin was created by a government entity and that that's who Satoshi is - what are the implications of that entity funding DPR?

Can somebody explain to me how the FBI could seize his bitcoins without knowing his password? My passwords for such things are long, written nowhere, and I enter them on oddball platforms and applications (e.g. not Windows). Is that not enough?