FBI Seizes Record 144,336 Bitcoins – Worth $28 Million

RT reports that the FBI have just made their biggest seizure of bitcoins to date, a staggering 144,336 worth an estimated $28 million at current market value. The FBI claim to have seized the “secret stash” of bitcoins belonging to the Silk Road online marketplace founder and owner. The bitcoins apparently belonged to “Dread Pirate Roberts”, which was Ross Ulbricht’s alias on the Silk Road marketplace. In the 2 years of Silk Road’s operation $1.2 billion is estimated to have been traded in bitcoin of which Silk Road charged between 8 and 15% commission.

It is claimed that despite the FBI having seized hundreds of thousands of bitcoins from shutting down the Silk Road operation it still cannot use those bitcoins. This is because the FBI currently lacks the password to the encrypted wallet needed to access them. Ulbricht’s $80 million of personal wealth in bitcoins thus remain inaccessible to the FBI, protecting the value and integrity of the currency from intervention by authorities (for the time being at least).

Image courtesy of George Frey/Getty Images/AFP