London, November 20 – Coinfirm has found substantial funds left by authorities on cryptocurrency wallets seized from criminals – and they may still have access to funds.
On November 5, 2020, the United States Department of Justice announced that it had seized stolen bitcoin valued at more than one billion dollars (1,000,000,000 USD) from an anonymous person known identified as ‘Individual X’. The funds had originally been hacked from the now defunct infamous online black-market exchange known as Silk Road.
While the Department of Justice enjoyed praise for securing the large asset seizure and ‘Individual X’ walked away from the incident without facing any criminal charges, the story does not end there as Coinfirm — the London-based industry leading blockchain analytics and anti-money laundering solutions platform — has identified millions of dollars in assets connected to that treasure trove that the Department of Justice seemingly left behind and to which Individual X might still have access.
Coinfirm has determined that although Individual X transferred to the U.S. government earlier this month the assets that had been sitting in cryptocurrency wallet 1HQ3Go3ggs8pFnXuHVHRytPCq5fGG8Hbhx since 2013 (at the time of which those assets were valued at approximately 14 million USD), there are still valuable balances held on forked addresses originating from that wallet. According to Coinfirm’s self-funded investigation, the following assets are among those that the U.S. government seemingly overlooked and left in the hands of whoever has access to the private keys of the main wallet:
- 693701 Bitcoin Diamond (“BCD”), which is presently worth approximately 310,000 USD
- 69370 Super Bitcoin (“SBTC”), which is presently worth approximately 66,000 USD
- 69370.11453606 Bitcoin Private (“BTCP”), which is presently worth approximately 11,000 USD
Whoever has access to the private keys of the main wallet, would still have access to these funds. This investigation was carried out by Coinfirm’s latest service – launched last month – Reclaim Fork.
Coinfirm’s cryptographic tracing efforts have identified dozens of cases in which law enforcement authorities may have unknowingly left substantial funds accessible to suspects instead of properly accounting for and seizing those assets. Coinfirm acts as a strong advocate for cryptocurrency investors harmed by the illegal actions of cryptocurrency thieves, money launderers, and market manipulators. Coinfirm is one of the world’s leaders in tracing and locating illicitly obtained cryptocurrency assets that have been lost to these activities.
If you are a cryptocurrency investor who has been victimized by any such activity and have had digital assets wrongfully taken from you and sequestered in unknown wallets or cryptocurrency exchanges, contact Coinfirm to determine if your assets can be traced and reclaimed through the Reclaim Crypto service.
Reclaim Fork aims to be a beneficial tool for the crypto community by allowing crypto investors to take back forked tokens so far withheld from them to further the ecosystem’s inclusivity. Regardless if the coins were on exchanges at the moment of fork or not.
At the announcement of Reclaim Fork going live Pawel Kuskowski, CEO and co-founder of Coinfirm stated that “We believe that customer protection and market integrity is critical for the long-term value of the crypto market.”
With partners like David Silver and Kroll, Coinfirm is able to recover funds from the most well-established exchanges. As well as enabling individuals to find the coins owed to them in a quick, simple and secure way the service will be of significant benefit to authorities as seen in the above example and adds to a growing stack of tools that continue to aid law enforcement in the cryptocurrency industry.
About Coinfirm
Coinfirm is a global leader in AML and regulatory technology for blockchain and cryptocurrencies. It offers the industry’s largest blockchain coverage, supporting over 1,500 cryptocurrencies and protocols including Bitcoin, Ethereum and many more. Coinfirm’s solutions are used by market leaders globally, ranging from crypto exchanges such as Binance, and protocols like XRP, to major financial institutions like PKO Bank Polski. Coinfirm is the first firm to offer an AML solution to DeFi in the form of the AML Oracle. The company’s services also include Trudatum, a standalone regtech platform that allows any file to be registered, signed, and verified with 100% accuracy.
The firm also carries out industry analysis demonstrating compliance strengths and weaknesses in the crypto sector as seen in the Know Your Exchange report.
