Bitfinex Offers $400 Million To Recover Bitcoin Stolen In 2016

Losing funds via hacks have become quite common in the crypto industry. While several, resort to legal means to take down the attackers, Bitfinex seems to have something else in mind. 

Bitfinex Takes A Different Route

The crypto-verse transitioned from being unknown to being valuable. While this did take time, it also spurred up the adoption rate. Along with the good comes the bad. The crypto industry was prey to several attacks over the years. Regardless of the magnitude of the attack, huge amounts of cryptocurrencies have been lost due to these attacks. While authorities still continue to probe certain unsolved hacks, a prominent cryptocurrency exchange has taken a different route to catch the attackers.

Hoping to recover the amount lost in an attack that took place back in 2016, cryptocurrency exchange, Bitfinex proposed a prize to those who could direct the exchange to the attackers. Back on 2 August 2016, the security system of the exchange was infiltrated which further caused a loss of almost 120,000 Bitcoins. Bitfinex, in its blog post, highlighted that those who could lead the exhcnage to the hackers would be rewarded with almost a whopping 400 million USD. Elaborating on the same, the exchange suggested that a total of 5 percent of the recovered Bitcoin would go to those who help reaching the hackers.

Back in February 2019, the authorities investigating the hack in the United States reportedly recovered a total of 27.66270285 Bitcoins from the 2016 hack. This would further leave the exchange with a total of $1.344 billion worth of Bitcoin.

Furthermore, the hackers would not be left without anything, as the exhcnage plans on letting the hackers keep about 25 percent of the recovered Bitcoin. Bitfinex pointed out that the details of those who help the exchange along with the details of the hackers would remain confidential. Speaking about the incident, the exchange wrote,

“This incident is a dark chapter in our exchange’s history, and we are pleased to offer this reward as further evidence of our determination to obtain the lost property.”

Soon after the exchange made this announcement, several from the community lauded the exchange for cutting a fair deal with everyone involved in the attack. However, a few others pointed out that law enforcement would still probe into the matter.