Reading this, I feel compelled to repost this old but still largely relevant blogpost:
I just lost 1,400 BTC
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Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#72I'm not an expert in BTC storage, but as far as I understand such an attack could have been prevented if the owner invested in a hardware wallet for $100-200. As the final step in a transaction would be to sign it on your ledger/trezor device, and would be much harder to phish.
This was my first thought too. Hardware wallets show transactions on their own screen so the amount and destination address can be confirmed on-device before the device signs the transaction, which seems like a great tool to avoid this kind of issue. Anyone that owns more cryptocurrency than a hardware wallet costs really needs to have a hardware wallet.
Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#73Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#74If I had that much in an old wallet, no way would I touch that myself or allow it anywhere near the internet. I would hire a team of experts and get the transaction over to my bank insured.
Do any big banks offer a BTC account?
Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#75Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#76Many folks shit on the modern financial system, with its centralization and Government-coupling, but things like this are actually trackable and reversible in that ecosystem. The safeguards have evolved over centuries. I am curious when crypto will get there. Maybe 10 years or so?
It is impossible by design. Adding that 'feature' takes away the core principle of decentralized currency. Allowing government to reverse transactions will also allow them to seize assets. Then it is just a regular currency (for better and worse).
Didn’t ethereum fork to rollback a hack they didn’t like?
Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#77Why would someone holding 1400 BTC use a software wallet instead of an offline hardware wallet? SMH
Yeah this is what blows my mind. I would be paranoid if I had 14 BTC, let alone 1400. When I had (as much as) 19 BTC some while ago I stored them on a Trezor, with the seed on a paper (three copies in different places) in a form that no one would realize it actually was a seed.
Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#78Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
Cash transactions aren't reversible or easily tracked.
Which is why it's not used for important purchases. Except illegal ones.
And it's why you'll notice that bill denominations didn't follow inflation. If no legitimate transactions need $100M in cash, it follows there is no need to make it practical to actually move $100M in cash.
For a while there was a workaround, it lasted a long time in the United States and after it ended Hollywood kept it around (in fiction) partly by using plots that were written when it was real and partly just because it looks cooler even though it's not possible.
Bearer Bonds. You'll notice that's what they're stealing in Die Hard. When it was made, and when it was set, Bearer Bonds weren't a thing (adverse tax treatment ensured they had basically ceased to exist) but when the novel the screenplay is based on was written it is reasonable that a wealthy multinational might possess large sums of Bearer Bonds in a vault.
Bearer Bonds were bonds (duh) but they weren't registered anywhere, the owner of the bond was whoever was holding it, just like cash, except a briefcase full of bonds could be worth tens of millions of dollars.
Re: I just lost 1,400 BTC
#80I can't believe someone would even allow a system with that balance to even connect to the internet. It's like filling a car with gold bars, driving it around town, and hoping nothing bad happens. He could have created another wallet, preferably a multisig, created the transaction with the software wallet offline, copied the signed transaction off and broadcast it from another system. What he did was reckless. Some p…
Bitcoin is all online. The analogy doesn't work: your gold bars are being driven around town all day and night in public view, already.
In this case, it's just the fact that the access was granted at the application level when the user logged into their wallet, which is like giving someone keys to your car by mistake.