I'm pretty sure there's a way to put bitcoin in a wallet with 2FA or something similar, right? Aren't bitcointalk's funds held in an arrangement like that?
It's multisig, which is more complicated and leads to higher transaction fees.
That might have been a good idea with this amateur-hour charity, since if they did that Cabalism13 would have had to ask permission from at least one of the other members before using some of the funds for his own purposes.
That's why there was an escrow involved.
I wouldn't have trusted bL4nkcode with 1 Bitcoin, but that's not relevant because the anonymous donator did trust him.The purpose of an escrow is to make sure funds are only used for the right cause.
Instead, he apparently sought advice from people who had nothing to do with the charity and were in no position to give him permission to do anything with those funds. At least that's what he claimed.
He could have claimed it was charity for his grandfather, which would at least make it a tiny bit in the spirit of the charity (assuming he was still alive at the time):
To be honest, yes. I have used 500$ from the funds back then for the medications of my deceased grandfather, I even asked before I did that on my Filipino Community
I don't believe the charity was started with the intention of scamming anyone. I think temptation and the availability of a large amount of money got the best of at least one of the members involved.
To quote myself:
"opportunity makes the thief"
I think most people would feel temptation at a high enough amount of money. It's best to prevent that opportunity from happening.