Ten years ago, more than 50 thousand bitcoins were stolen through the “Silkroad” website, which specializes in drug trafficking.
Hours ago, the US authorities announced the success of the seizure of stolen bitcoins, amounting to $ 3.4 billion, and found them in the home of a 32-year-old young man, in the US state of Georgia.
James Jong, 32, pleaded guilty Friday to stealing more than 50,000 bitcoins in September 2012, New York prosecutors announced in a statement.
A box of popcorn in the bathroom.. the secret of a fortune stolen a decade ago
This encrypted digital wealth was stored in devices hidden in a safe hidden by the accused himself under the floor, and on a computer camouflaged in a metal box of popcorn under covers in the bathroom closet.
In a statement, Attorney General Damien Williams said: “In the nearly ten years, questions related to the locating of this vast amount of unfinished Bitcoin have grown into a mystery worth more than $3.3 billion, but the raid that took place in November 2021, It was the reason for solving the mystery and recovering the lost wealth.”
“Thanks to advanced crypto-tracking technologies and good old-fashioned work with police, security forces have located this amazing cache and recovered products from criminal activities,” he added.
But the value of the refund has fallen since the operation as the price of bitcoin has fallen, and in recent hours its value has reached just over $1 billion.
The attorney general’s office indicated that Jung deceived the Silkroad site in 2012 by creating nine different accounts and quickly conducting nearly 140 financial transactions to incentivize the site’s system to pay nearly 50,000 bitcoins to his account, before quickly transferring this amount. to other addresses.
Jung faces up to 20 years in prison. His verdict will be decided in February.
Silk Road was established in January 2011, and was used to sell many illegal goods, including drugs worth $200 million worldwide, before it was closed down by the US Federal Police in October 2013.
The site’s founder, Ross Ulbricht, was sentenced to life in prison in 2015.
This is the second largest seizure of bitcoin funds by the US authorities, after the seizure of 94,000 bitcoins worth an estimated $ 3.6 billion from New York duo during a hacking of the Bitfinex digital transaction platform in 2016.
