ARTICLE
13 January 2021

Do You Know Your Bitcoin Password?

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Foley & Lardner

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The NewYorkTimes.com reported about a lost password for Bitcoin that "Stefan Thomas, a German-born programmer living in San Francisco, has two guesses left to figure out a password that is worth, as of this week, about $220 million."
United States Technology

The NewYorkTimes.com reported about a lost password for Bitcoin that "Stefan Thomas, a German-born programmer living in San Francisco, has two guesses left to figure out a password that is worth, as of this week, about $220 million."  The January 12, 2021 article entitled "Lost Passwords Lock Millionaires Out of Their Bitcoin Fortunes" included these comments about Mr. Thomas' plight:

The password will let him unlock a small hard drive, known as an IronKey, which contains the private keys to a digital wallet that holds 7,002 Bitcoin.

While the price of Bitcoin dropped sharply on Monday, it is still up more than 50 percent from just a month ago when it passed its previous all-time high around $20,000.

The problem is that Mr. Thomas years ago lost the paper where he wrote down the password for his IronKey, which gives users 10 guesses before it seizes up and encrypts its contents forever.

He has since tried eight of his most commonly used password formulations — to no avail.

There should be a PASSWORD lesson in this story!

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