Michael Stay, CTO of Pyrofex Corporations and ex-Google security engineer (hacker) has broken into an encrypted zip file to recover $300,000 worth bitcoins for a Russian investor who was anonymous according to a recent speech. It was said that this anonymous Russian investor approached him because of his past track records of hacking encrypted zip files. He told Stay, “if we find the password successfully, I will thank”.

However, Stay picked up the challenge. He is an experienced hacker who has worked for Google as security engineer for six years. He was also said to have written about 30 password cracker guides for accessing Data since the early 1990s.

To open the file, Stay developed a program that tried different combinations of passwords over a period. This was because the encryption on the file was robust and he had little or no information to help. The investor couldn’t recall key info as well, so he wasn’t really of help.

The initial process of combination of passwords was to take a number of months. To ease and save time, Stay employed the help of the Nash Foster, Pyrofex CEO to assist in the task. It cost $7,000 to finish the task. According to Stay, it would have taken a longer time if the software program was updated. About $300,000 was recovered and Stay was paid $100,000.

The investor was said to have purchased the bitcoins for $10,000 in 2016. He thought he had lost the bitcoins forever when he forgot the password to the encrypted file where he kept his bitcoins according to Stay. A man lost bitcoin that would have been worth $100M today, ten years ago.

Issue of security of Cryptocurrency
Tal Be’ery, co-founder of keyless bitcoin wallet made some comments on the issue. He said the fear of losing private keys make people keep it in encrypted file but they might end up losing it –

“ when people think about the security of their cryptocurrency private key they fear it will get stolen so they try to hide it as much as possible but in reality it’s much more likely to be subject to loss”.

Michael Stay, CTO of Pyrofex Corporations and ex-Google security engineer (hacker) has broken into an encrypted zip file to recover $300,000 worth bitcoins for a Russian investor who was anonymous according to a recent speech. It was said that this anonymous Russian investor approached him because of his past track records of hacking encrypted zip files. He told Stay, “if we find the password successfully, I will thank”.

However, Stay picked up the challenge. He is an experienced hacker who has worked for Google as security engineer for six years. He was also said to have written about 30 password cracker guides for accessing Data since the early 1990s.

To open the file, Stay developed a program that tried different combinations of passwords over a period. This was because the encryption on the file was robust and he had little or no information to help. The investor couldn’t recall key info as well, so he wasn’t really of help.

The initial process of combination of passwords was to take a number of months. To ease and save time, Stay employed the help of the Nash Foster, Pyrofex CEO to assist in the task. It cost $7,000 to finish the task. According to Stay, it would have taken a longer time if the software program was updated. About $300,000 was recovered and Stay was paid $100,000.

The investor was said to have purchased the bitcoins for $10,000 in 2016. He thought he had lost the bitcoins forever when he forgot the password to the encrypted file where he kept his bitcoins according to Stay. A man lost bitcoin that would have been worth $100M today, ten years ago.

Issue of security of Cryptocurrency
Tal Be’ery, co-founder of keyless bitcoin wallet made some comments on the issue. He said the fear of losing private keys make people keep it in encrypted file but they might end up losing it –

“ when people think about the security of their cryptocurrency private key they fear it will get stolen so they try to hide it as much as possible but in reality it’s much more likely to be subject to loss”.