{"id":108650,"date":"2021-01-17T14:00:43","date_gmt":"2021-01-17T14:00:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/precoinnews.com\/?p=108650"},"modified":"2021-01-17T14:00:43","modified_gmt":"2021-01-17T14:00:43","slug":"140-billion-bitcoin-not-moved-in-years-lost-says-national-cyber-security-council","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/precoinnews.com\/bitcoin\/140-billion-bitcoin-not-moved-in-years-lost-says-national-cyber-security-council\/","title":{"rendered":"$140 Billion Bitcoin Not Moved in Years, “Lost” Says National Cyber Security Council"},"content":{"rendered":"
More than four million bitcoin, worth $140 billion, has not moved in the past five years according to blockchain data.<\/p>\n
There remain almost precisely one million bitcoin mined in 2009 which have not moved, widely assumed to belong to Satoshi Nakamoto, bitcoin’s inventor.<\/p>\n
Another 1.4 million bitcoin was mined in 2010 and 2011, with the rest then mined up to 2016.<\/p>\n
“Over $140 billion in the Bitcoin cryptocurrency is currently lost or inaccessible,” UK’s National Cybersecurity Council (NCSC) said.<\/p>\n
It’s not clear how they reached the conclusion all of these are lost because just last year some bitcoin miners signed 145 bitcoin addresses mined in 2009 to show ownership.<\/p>\n
As evidence, NCSC cited some American programmer who has only two more tries left for the password to $220 million bitcoin.<\/p>\n
NCSC’s solution is to get a paperwallet, which is fairly sound advice as long as you can secure it and remember where you put it.<\/p>\n
Many of these coins were probably lost in the early days when bitcoin’s value was in pennies.<\/p>\n
Plenty just wiped their hard-drive or uninstalled the bitcoin software, especially coders who were just trying to see what this is, thinking nothing of the penny bitcoin they got.<\/p>\n
Since at least 2013 however great care is now taken to secure holdings so as to avoid landfill expeditions.<\/p>\n
Moreover this 4 million figure is interesting because in December 2019 we reported 4 million had not moved in five years and now a year later, it’s still 4 million in five years.<\/p>\n
That means one million has moved and another one million has been added through the passage of time.<\/p>\n
Suggesting much of this four million may be holders, and as time passes, some get out of the holding group while some others join.<\/p>\n
Making the stability of this four million interesting as in effect it reduces bitcoin’s total supply by 22%.<\/p>\n