Alright so bad news is it seems like the hacker does indeed have control of the escrow wallet. I can't decrypt it anymore using the password I previously had so it has been changed. I won't be able to return the coins sent to the escrow addresses. I also noticed a lot of the addresses sent to the hacker are not addresses from my escrow wallet except for a few.
My tipping address was also within the same wallet so any funds in that address has also been taken:
https://blockchain.info/address/14PUWBwK854GLenxSa7MAuxXQUXK4DKKi5This address contains about 2.1 of my own BTC from fees/tips I've gathered from escrowing this past year. The rest seems to be sent to them by other people, as instructed by whoever gained access to my bitcointalk account.
In this case I will have no choice but to repay everyone using my own funds. Unfortunately I don't possess the liquidity to be able to repay everyone all at once, but rest assured I will work to pay this off. I apologize again for this. It was my own negligence for not keeping better back ups.
I will be creating a repayment thread in the reputation section and it will be self-modded to prevent the trolls from trying to mess things up any further.
I'll be contacting individuals who have had their funds taken away from them, will ask for verification and then will proceed to paying each person one by one when funds become available.
At this point I am sure a lot of people won't even believe me. If that's the case then go right ahead and dox me, either way it won't matter to me.
Thanks to Kingzee for creating this thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1307926.0I'll be using that thread to cross-reference the addresses I can see in the wallet and make payments accordingly. I'll also be asking for repayment addresses just so I don't end up sending it to the wrong people or people trying to claim the payments that don't belong to them. Too many god damn trolls here, consider this my last reply to this particular thread.
Sorry for disappointing everyone, I too had my hopes up.
Are you absolutely sure that you don't have any backup of the wallet somewhere so you can recover it? You are sure that you don't have paper backups, backups on external drives, backups on flashdrives, etc.?
If you don't have access to the wallet but the hacker does, then why aren't the funds gone yet?
Also, would you be willing to send a trusted member a copy of your wallet (it is encrypted so nothing can be stolen really) so that they can verify that the addresses the supposed hacker used are not actually in your wallet?
Lastly, if you solicit donations for repayment, can you use a multisig escrow with multiple trusted escrows on the forum (they can't be all bad or colluding right?) That would ensure that the victims can get their funds back and that you aren't scamming the donors.
I have the wallet files backed up and restored but my password isn't working thus I'm unable to send any funds out. The hacker likely didn't move the funds because he already knows he has full control over them and can move them anytime they want.
And no, I won't be needing to ask for donations. Not like anyone would want to donate directly to me anyway after all of this. It is my own fuck up for getting keylogged or whatever it was, I don't expect or want anyone to step in for me. I'll be able to repay everyone on my own.