We all know that bitcoin was earlier stolen by James "Jimmy" Zhong
James Zhong is an American man who was convicted in 2022 for stealing over 51,680 bitcoin (then worth about $620,000; value as of 2023 approximately $3.4 billion) from the online black market Silk Road between 2012 and 2014.He was also involved in the early development of bitcoin,he found an error on Silk Road that allowed him to withdraw more funds than what was initially deposited. This was activated by repeatedly double clicking the withdraw button, and further abused by using multiple accounts on the website. Zhong managed to conceal his identity and elude detection for nearly 10 years. He lived a luxurious lifestyle, using tools such as cryptocurrency mixers to obscure the origin of the bitcoin he spent. In 2019, he made a mistake by transferring a small amount of stolen bitcoin to a cryptocurrency exchange that followed know-your-customer rules. The IRS's criminal investigation division then tracked him down.
Source link:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Zhong#It turns out that Bitcoin stealers target not only big companies but individual users with modest amounts in their crypto wallets.
Now bitcoin is one of the safest way to invest digital currency. Because of its new and improved security system it makes it hard for hackers and thief to access
So now the question is bitcoin safe from hackers?, can it be stolen?
Thing is the media sensationalizes large-scale bitcoin thefts when the amount of small-time bitcoin robberies amount to millions of dollars each day. But to their credit JZ was a top-tier criminal for the lump of lard that he is. Only thing is that he doesn’t really outrightly hurt people by the stealings he committed, but instead Silk Road itself as he steals their treasuries collected from customer funds through them, so when shit gets going Silk Road’s left to top up how much he had taken from them.
There’s a part of me that wanted to be sad for the guy too. He pretty much stated that he’s bullied all his life for how fat he is and the only gratification he got was when he got rich from the stealings. Then the government swooped in when they saw him for the big fat sweaty and oily dollar sign that he is, arrested him and threatened jail time on him until he relented and gave them the keys to his million dollar net worth. What a sad story of a guy bullied all his life only to he bullied again by the internet and the government.
Oh well. Of course this means bitcoins can be stolen, but unlike money, anybody with an access to the transaction hash and an internet connection capable of running a toaster could track who stole the bitcoins.