Germany: Police seize bitcoins worth €2 billion::German authorities have seized 50,000 bitcoins, worth some €2 billion, in what could be the largest seizure to date in the country.

  • Aussiemandeus
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    2
    arrow-down
    16
    ·
    11 months ago

    Its decentralised blah blah blah and yet the government took it.

    • makeasnek@lemmy.ml
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      21
      ·
      edit-2
      11 months ago

      They handed over their own BTC over to the government. If you have the private keys, you control the coin. If you don’t, no amount of money or guns can make that coin move thanks to math and physics. However, a $5 wrench rammed repeatedly into your head may make you divulge those private keys. Strength of encryption is rarely the weakest link in any modern cryptographic system. But that wrench used on anybody who doesn’t know the keys? Useless. It’s pretty powerful stuff in that regard.

    • jwing@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      11 months ago

      That is a weird way of admitting that you rushed to the comment section instead of, you know, reading the article.