Ever since a single Bitcoin became worth a small fortune, there have been people trying to steal them. Sure, there have some small-time thieves who’ve stolen a few hundred dollars worth of Bitcoin here and there. But there have also been heists. Massive, highly orchestrated attacks that lead to millions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency changing hands. And they just keep happening.
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Bad news, you lovers of liberty and cryptocurrency. Somebody just hacked into the resurrected version of the Silk Road (a.k.a. Silk Road 2)
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Almost exactly two years ago, Wired published a feature about Bitcoin, comparing the cryptocurrency to "overhyped Silicon Valley IPOs." The headline read, matter-of-factly, "The Rise and Fall of Bitcoin." And, while the magazine was right about the rise, the fall is still to come.
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If there’s one thing cops don’t like, it’s being disrespected. So when some renegade launches a clone of Silk Road, the underground drug marketplace that Feds recently shut down, they’re just begging to get arrested. They even made the homepage a spoof of an FBI-seized domain. That’s disrespectful!
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As of Friday afternoon, the FBI had managed to seize 144,000 bitcoins from Silk Road’s founder. Worth some $28.5 million in current exchange rates, that’s the largest ever seizure of the cryptocurrency. But based on the Bitcoin trail uncovered in recent weeks, over $50 million could still be missing
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Welp, that settles that. Anybody who was wondering if authorities were going to keep going after the arrest of Silk Road kingpin Ross Ulbricht and start targeting users don’t need to wonder anymore. Multiple arrests have now been made worldwide, and it looks like more are on the way.
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Ross Ulbricht’s arrest last week
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The man alleged to be "Dread Pirate Roberts," the founder and operator of the Silk Road—an online marketplace where bitcoins were traded for a range of goods and services, including drugs—was arrested by the FBI in San Francisco Wednesday. The criminal complaint, released today, provides many details about how the site and its users relied on widespread anonymity technology, including Tor and Bitcoin.
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Ross Ulbricht, the recently arrested mastermind behind Silk Road, appeared in court today where his lawyer begged for more time before the detention hearing. The judge said he didn’t "know what you’re going to accomplish in the next several days." Maybe move some of his massive stash of hidden Bitcoin?
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An anonymous, underground drug trafficking web site Silk Road has been busted and the founder has been arrested, effectively shutting down a $1 billion+ revenue business after two years. And in softer tech news, Instagram has revealed plans to put ads in the stream over the next couple months. Meanwhile, BlackBerry continues to be in shambles, with BBM for Android and iOS delayed and the Z30 reportedly not going on sale in the company’s home country of Canada on Rogers.
We discuss all this and more in this week’s episode of the TC Gadgets Podcast, featuring John Biggs, Matt Burns, Jordan Crook, Chris Velazco, Darrell Etherington, and a special guest appearance by Chris Nesi.
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