Also, how exactly do you "seize" cryptocurrency without hard forking it?
They send it to another wallet/account that they control. Not hard to understand.
And if they don't send? With electronically stored fiat, the feds can just ask the bank to give them the money right out of their account, and I'm sure the banks would cooperate. With paper cash they can just hold their arm while the SWAT team go on a rampage through their bedsheets for the cash.
What does one do for Bitcoin, short of a hard fork?
Yeah Elliptic and Chainanalysis make all their money by convincing people that all transfers are of the same Ultimate Beneficial Owner until it hits an exchange As long as the ignorance stays high, they get government contracts
That's utter bs, exchanges generates unique BIP32 addresses for deposit. There isn't a master exchanges key used among all customers.
Which is not something I commented on at all
Genuinely curious why you think your response was related or even mutually exclusive
They send it to another wallet/account that they control. Not hard to understand.
And if they don't send? With electronically stored fiat, the feds can just ask the bank to give them the money right out of their account, and I'm sure the banks would cooperate. With paper cash they can just hold their arm while the SWAT team go on a rampage through their bedsheets for the cash. What does one do for Bitcoin, short of a hard fork?
In crypto „seizing” means getting access to the wallet and sending funds to the one that gov’t has under it’s sole control
I am guessing that the key pair generation process was faulty. The FBI found an exploit in a wallet used by the hackers allowing the private key to be predicted. The prefix is bc1,which is uncommon. A few weeks ago there was such a vulnerability with Cake Wallet. Or they installed malware on the hacker's computers and were able to log the private key as it was generated. Or the hackers foolishly stored the key pairs…
I'm wondering if the attackers sent their coins through a mixer, and now some chump with money on coinbase just got his coins jacked b/c he deposited after using a shady mixer.
This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…
It always struck me as improbable that all these high profile (and notoriously hard/impossible to attribute) attacks on “critical infrastructure” or whatever are always instantly and authoritatively pinned (by US authorities) on groups operating in the US’s geopolitical enemies. “Russian hackers” once again, eh?
I think you’re conflating a wide range of things: most attacks aren’t linked to those countries and the ones which are often take time to link. Ransomware attacks have been happening frequently for ages, but most of them don’t reach the level where they’re being classed as infrastructure attacks — they’re gangs of opportunists looking for easy money. You find them in countries like Russia because there are only a few places which don’t cooperate with US/EU law enforcement, especially at the level where someone without powerful backers can rely on it. These guys caught a much bigger fish than they were prepared for and weren’t anywhere close to being prepared for a nation-state to seriously pursue them. Anyone trying this from most other countries would either be caught or much better at staying hidden.
This story makes absolutely no sense at all. The errors present by these hackers are so comical it's simply unbelievable. I'm supposed to believe some elite Russian hacking group keeps their crypto wallets running on a US host where the FBI just logs right in and snatches the private key? I'm starting to entertain the conspiracies that the future of commodities price manipulation is fake ransomware attacks. There nee…
Why are they elite? Ransomware is the new smash and grab.
The press release specifically mentions that the cryptocurrency was seized through FBI having posession of the private key.
As someone who has been on the receiving end of federal seizure orders for cryptocurrency private keys, they were in my case satisfied by publishing a transfer (signature) to a USG address, not actual disclosure of private key material, despite that being explicitly stated in the order.
And if they don't send? With electronically stored fiat, the feds can just ask the bank to give them the money right out of their account, and I'm sure the banks would cooperate. With paper cash they can just hold their arm while the SWAT team go on a rampage through their bedsheets for the cash. What does one do for Bitcoin, short of a hard fork?
In crypto „seizing” means getting access to the wallet and sending funds to the one that gov’t has under it’s sole control
How do they get access to the wallet, assuming the dude won't tell them? With fiat they can do it with force, that's the difference. If the dude won't tell them they have no way to get access to it, other than the $5 wrench.
Exactly. Until DOJ provides proof, this is pure FUD. Anyone competent enough to extort a foreign company out of millions is not going to attempt to cash out through an exchange.
Are you saying the government didn’t actually recover the money that they claim to have recovered?