PUBLISHED

ECDSA Nonces, Lattice, RNG et Patterns : Decrypting a Bitcoin Exploit

2025-07-1125 min

When the Investigation Outgrows the Investigator 🕵️‍♂️

A few days ago, on July 6, 2025, I published my first investigation on cyphertux.net about the mysterious 80,000 BTC moved on July 4, 2025. What followed exceeded all my expectations: nearly a million views, fiery debates across the entire crypto community, and a collective realization that something significant was happening.

But above all, one troubling fact became clear: I was apparently the only person in the world conducting a full technical investigation into this case.

The Prologue to a Much Larger Story

What I initially thought was the conclusion of my first investigation turned out to be only a prologue. Since that publication, discoveries have followed at a dizzying pace. Every lead unearthed new mysteries. Every answer raised ten new questions.

First and foremost, a massive thank you. Thank you to everyone who has been following my investigations over the past few days and who gave me unprecedented visibility. Your support, your questions, and your contributions have been essential in keeping this inquiry alive. Special thanks to @IssamSatoshi, @ArnoMac12, @RadioChadFr, and all the contributors who enrich this investigation through their expert analyses or our constructive exchanges.

The Transformation of an Investigation into a Revelation

What began as the analysis of a mysterious fund movement has evolved into something far deeper: the potential discovery of the most unexpected cryptographic exploit in Bitcoin’s history. (That far? Not really.)

From biased ECDSA nonces to historical RNG vulnerabilities, from lattice attacks to exploitable patterns, through unbelievably sophisticated legal constructs and disturbing connections to controversial figures in the ecosystem… this investigation took me down paths I never imagined.

The Anatomy of Unprecedented Sophistication

What follows isn’t just the continuation of my investigation. It is the progressive revelation of an operation that combines:

Technical innovation: A first-of-its-kind exploit
Legal strategy: Using existing laws to legalize the illegal
Psychological warfare: Symbolic timing and clever narrative camouflage

The Lone Detective Against the Impossible

To this day, I remain the only investigator to have connected all these dots. This unique position allowed me to see what no one else saw — but it also reveals something troubling about the nature of this operation: it was designed to go unnoticed.

Here is the full anatomy of what I consider to be the most sophisticated Bitcoin exploit ever documented.

An investigation that suggests we may be witnessing only the early days of a cryptographic revolution that few have yet realized is unfolding.

A Wild Investigative Timeline

Since that first publication, I’ve spent a considerable amount of time digging into every lead, analyzing every technical detail, dissecting every suspicious connection. This investigation led me down paths I never imagined.

My starting point: Craig Wright and Calvin Ayre. The PDF modification dated July 4, the “Solomon” references in his historical tweets, the ties to the Kleiman trial… everything seemed to point to a sophisticated operation orchestrated by the man who claims to be Satoshi.

But in hindsight, one question haunts me: Were we deliberately led down this path? As someone familiar with steganography, I realize that this trail may have been too easy. Amateurs at this level would never have left such obvious clues — unless it was intentional. A clever strategy to ensure that investigators like me would rapidly follow this false lead.

The steganographic rabbit hole deepens. Beyond the simple OP_RETURN spam, there’s a sequence of numbers still under analysis that you’ll come to understand throughout this investigation — one worthy of a Netflix series. Stay seated and focused.

Expert-level steganography: The Wikipedia page linked in my previous article presents a disturbing homonym with the name Craig Wright in the introduction. Coincidence? Really? Yet the spam in the fourth message was sent at very specific intervals.

Why am I specifically referring to the fourth message? It’s quite simple: in 30 seconds, upon reading that message, I was naturally guided toward the dedicated episode page mentioning the October 5th air date — but also to that number sequence and that homonym I hadn’t revealed in my previous report. You can imagine why.

My investigative journey: From advanced cryptographic techniques to legal constructs (Salomon Brothers, EisnerAmper), through disturbing findings on Bitcointalk (JohnnyTX, Puzzle #130), and the emergence of new hypotheses (a government operation with @IssamSatoshi).

My destination: A conclusion vastly different from my original assumptions!

The Evolution of My Theories

This investigation went through several phases:

Craig Wright Phase: Suspected sophisticated operation orchestrated by Wright/Ayre
Government Phase: Alternate theory by @IssamSatoshi of an IRS-CI/FBI operation
Revelation Phase: Statement from Salomon Brothers claiming to “protect the ecosystem”
Technical Phase: Discovery of ECDSA vulnerabilities and lattice attacks
Final Phase: My conclusion after synthesizing all these discoveries

Putting Yourself in the Shoes of Whoever Pulled Off This Exploit

Today, after this insane investigative timeline, I’ve reached what seems to me the most coherent final theory. If I put myself in the shoes of whoever orchestrated this operation, they had to think everything through very carefully:

How to exploit historical cryptographic vulnerabilities
How to mask the operation behind a credible legal façade
How to choose the perfect timing (July 4 — symbolic)
How to avoid overly sensitive wallets (Satoshi) while maximizing impact
How to craft a narrative cover (“ecosystem protection”)

This strategic thinking, this meticulous planning, this surgical execution… that’s what my final analysis reveals.

The Full Anatomy of a Revolutionary Exploit

What follows is the complete chronological account of my discoveries — an investigation that reveals how biased ECDSA nonces, historical RNG flaws, lattice attacks, and the discovery of exploitable patterns enabled what I now consider the most sophisticated Bitcoin exploit ever documented.

Here is my final thesis, built upon countless days of relentless investigation.

The First Wright Suspicions (July 7–9)

July 8: The Discovery That Changes Everything? (remember this one)

My investigation takes a sharp turn when we uncover something troubling in the Kleiman v. Wright lawsuit documents. In the court files, we find two Bitcoin addresses explicitly mentioned:

“1KbrSKrT3GeEruTuuYYUSQ35JwKbrAWJYm” and “12tLs9c9RsALt4ockxa1hB4iTCTSmxj2me”

These two addresses received 10k BTC on April 2, 2011 — and were already listed in the Kleiman v. Wright case. One of them belonged to the “DAVE KLEIMAN’S ELECTRONIC DATA STORAGE DEVICES”, which Wright tried to submit as evidence in September 2021. (See post by @RadioChad — to be taken with caution; the infamous “faketoshi” is a peculiar figure I intentionally left out of my previous, factual article.)

The scenario that emerges:

2011: Dave Kleiman owns/controls these wallets
2014: Wright requests the wallet.dat from Kleiman’s family
2018–2021: Trial — Wright claims access to Kleiman’s devices
2025: These same addresses move 80k BTC

Clustering analysis shows that the four clusters documented in the trial account for over 131k BTC in total. The 80k BTC move may only be a part of that trove!

My first intuition: Wright literally used Dave Kleiman’s wallets dormant for 14 years to execute his “Solomon… sowing seed widely” plan? Is this state-sanctioned recovery or organized theft disguised as legality?

🔗 See tweet from @RadioChad

The Improbable Timing of Wright’s PDF

That same day, I discover something even more chilling:

📅 July 4, 2025:

4:06 PM UTC: Craig commits his PDF with his name revealed
Same day: 80k BTC move in the largest Bitcoin operation in history

See details here and here

The document “False Premises, Failed Promises: BTC’s Market Illusion and the Abandonment of Bitcoin’s Design” follows a suspicious timeline:

Created July 1
Pushed anonymously on June 27
Author revealed on July 4, exactly when the transfer happens

[Insert GitHub commit image of Craig here]

Even more chilling: I find this tweet from Wright dated October 2022:

“Solomon talked of trade… of sowing seed widely… where may that be…”

Was Wright already planning to “harvest” the bitcoins through Salomon Brothers?

My Emerging Wright-Ayre Strategy:

Wright recovers Dave Kleiman’s wallets (2014 email)
Calvin Ayre invests heavily in mining (cover for brute-forcing)
10+ years spent cracking TrueCrypt-protected wallets
July 4, 2025: Perfect execution with legal façade via “Salomon Brothers”

Why this raises eyebrows:

The arrogance: Messages like “fuck”, blatant defiance
The legal angle: Wright is obsessively litigious
The timing: Too perfect. Coincidence? Really?

Counter-argument by IssamSatoshi

But quickly, @IssamSatoshi brought forth an alternative theory that caught my attention:

“All my investigations lead me to believe this is a crypto-tax tracing or testing operation conducted by a U.S. federal agency. Think IRS-CI or FBI…”

His analysis of EisnerAmper is particularly compelling:

“The postal address listed in the legal notice on salomonbros.com points to a physical location associated with the audit firm EisnerAmper — a firm that works closely with the IRS. This address provides perfect cover for justifying a fictitious activity without raising immediate suspicion.”

IssamSatoshi develops a sophisticated theory of a “crypto-tax tracing operation” combining:

Signals injected into the blockchain via OP_RETURN
A web infrastructure that appears legitimate
A pseudo-legal narrative built around a prestigious domain

The goal: To awaken, trace, and potentially correlate dormant wallet owners to real-world identities.

July 9: “After the shockwave, comes clarity”

The next morning (8:11 AM), after nearing one million views, I published my reflection on the implications:

“What we must now accept: There are two uncomfortable truths that can no longer be dismissed:

The myth of the ‘dormant wallet’ is permanently broken
Weak signals are no longer weak when they start to pile up”

I listed the disturbing elements:

Funds moved right after the OP_RETURN messages
Craig Wright’s PDF modified on the same day
The wallet owner’s behavior — mysterious in itself
A specific date that feels like a countdown: September 30, 2025

My central question: If the person behind the wallet was truly a careful BTC holder…

Why move the funds right after those visible messages?

They could’ve waited 3 or 4 days. But they didn’t.

They moved immediately.

This action unintentionally gave credibility to the OP_RETURN messages.

External Validation: BitMEX Research

Radio Chad then reposted BitMEX Research’s analysis, which seemed to confirm my suspicions:

“BitMEX Research describes the setup as ‘a Calvin Ayre-style legal scam,’ similar to past attempts by Craig Wright and associates to seize Mt. Gox coins through creative legal theories.”

Analyst @0xZilayo added: “most definitely phishing attempts and have no legitimacy.”

But something still bothered me.

My Final Conviction: “This Wright theory smells too staged”

On the evening of July 9 (9:13 PM), I shared my most candid opinion:

“For those who think the 8-wallet holder panicked after receiving the OP_RETURNs… please. Seriously? That’s funny. Who in their right mind would take SalomonBros spam seriously? Gérard at the bar downstairs? Let’s be real.”

My thinking evolved: Everyone’s watching Wright, searching for sophisticated conspiracies…

But what if it was someone much smarter?

The Insight from NY Legal Procedures

While reviewing New York’s unclaimed funds procedures, one thing became crystal clear:

What if some random Bitcointalk guy simply studied actual legal processes?

Abandoned property protocols
How to legally “claim” dormant funds
The due diligence required by the State of New York
How to turn a technical exploit into a legal recovery

My final angle: While everyone is chasing Wright and supposed conspiracies, an anonymous genius is using the law to legitimize their exploit. They played 4D chess while everyone else chased ghost theories.

The Major Turning Point: Salomon Brothers Statement

BREAKING | A Revelation That Changes Everything

Just as my suspicions around Wright were starting to fade, a completely unexpected revelation drops.

The entity behind the OP_RETURN messages has just published a FULL STATEMENT that shifts everything we thought we knew about this operation.

🔍 WHAT WAS REVEALED:

✅ Salomon Brothers claims to be a financial advisory firm based in New York

✅ Stated objective: Identify wallets that are TRULY abandoned vs. those still accessible

✅ Motivation: Prevent abandoned wallets from falling into the wrong hands (rogue states, criminals)

✅ Scope: Less than one-third of 1% of all crypto wallets are concerned

✅ Confirmed success: Some owners have ALREADY reacted last week by moving their funds

💡 KEY REVELATION:

“The only thing owners need to do is move their funds to prove access to their private keys.”

No scam. No phishing. Just:

“Prove you have access, and we’ll leave you alone.”

🎯 MAJOR IMPLICATIONS:

Recovery fund offered to those who lost their keys but can prove ownership
Direct response to hacking accusations in the crypto press
Paradigm shift: From a suspected exploit to an operation to “clean up” abandoned wallets

❓ REMAINING QUESTIONS:

How do they have access to private keys if they’re not hackers?

The technical sophistication behind this still hasn’t been explained.

Immediate Critical Response from IssamSatoshi

@IssamSatoshi reacted instantly with a razor-sharp legal analysis:

“What ‘Salomon Brothers’ just published raises several major issues: technical, legal, and even ethical.”

His key arguments:

These wallets are NOT legally “abandoned”

Neither Bitcoin nor Ethereum have any native timeout logic
Without an explicit rule in the protocol, no third party can determine “abandonment”

An OP_RETURN is not a legal notice

It’s just a free-form field in a Bitcoin transaction
No guarantee of authenticity or admissibility
A signaling tactic — not a legal procedure

The cited legal framework doesn’t apply to blockchains

NY Unclaimed Funds Law concerns third-party custodians
Not self-custodied assets on a blockchain

A dangerous precedent is being set

Claiming that an inactive wallet is a “threat”
Justifying surveillance of silent addresses

IssamSatoshi stands firm: “As for me, I maintain the theory of a crypto-tax tracing operation led by a U.S. state entity (IRS-CI, DoJ, or similar), aiming to map and, if possible, lure dormant crypto fortunes.”

Major Discovery: The Scale Is Growing

While I’m still digesting this disturbing statement, I stumble upon something even more unsettling:

🚨 Another massive dormant wallet cluster just moved: 17,000 BTC from 2019 wallets ALL activated July 8–9, 2025

How did we miss this? Arkham’s clustering algorithms should have caught it…

I even spot another 15k BTC wallet that recently moved, but can’t find it again (need sleep 😅).

Timeline of recent dormant awakenings:

Satoshi-era (2010–2011): 80k BTC
2019 era: 17k BTC (this cluster)
Unknown era: 15k BTC (lost track)
Others: ???

My shocking realization: “These 2019 wallets are more recent, but the pattern is EXTREMELY troubling. I thought only Satoshi-era wallets were being targeted by the spam campaign… That theory no longer holds.” 🚨

My Deep Personal Discomfort

This discovery forces me to publish my most honest reaction yet:

“🚨 The 80,000 BTC case is taking a turn no one expected! I’ve spent hours digging into what I thought was the greatest cryptographic exploit in Bitcoin history. And now… BOOM.”

🤯 THE SCENARIO I LEAST EXPECTED

After analyzing every technical detail, every cultural reference (Lost Numbers), every easter egg (EisnerAmper), I was ready for anything — EXCEPT THIS:

“We are not hackers. We identify abandoned wallets to protect the Bitcoin ecosystem.” (Can you believe that? Think about it if it were real.)

💡 WHAT DISTURBS ME MOST:

The simplicity of their request: “You got a notification? Move your funds. That’s it.”

Barely any interaction with their website
No phishing
No data collection
Just: “Prove access”
Or: “Provide administrative proof” (strange how these wallets weren’t randomly selected)

The scale vs. the stealth: Why orchestrate such a massive spam campaign just to target such a tiny fraction of wallets? Less than one-third of 1%, according to them.
The technical mystery: THEY STILL HAVE ACCESS TO PRIVATE KEYS. How? If they’re not hackers, then what are they?

🧩 THEORIES THAT HAUNT ME:

Who is this mysterious “client”?

Satoshi cleaning up the ecosystem he created?
Roger Ver, Craig Wright, or another early OG?
Someone who found an old HDD with wallet.dat files?
An institutional entity with cryptanalytic capabilities?

💭 MY CURRENT THOUGHTS:

This revelation is forcing me to reconsider EVERYTHING.

What I know now:

This is NOT a traditional scam
They have extraordinary technical capabilities
Their approach is strangely… ethical?
They’re even offering a Recovery Fund for people who lost their keys

What I still don’t understand:

How they have access to private keys
Why the elaborate narrative and symbolism
Who they really are
Why they’re operating from the shadows

Detailed Strategic Response from IssamSatoshi

In response to my unease, @IssamSatoshi expanded his theory with surgical precision:

“This operation is neither a private awareness campaign nor a hacking attempt. It resembles a dormant asset awakening and tracing operation, indirectly conducted by a U.S. government entity.”

Identified Strategic Objectives:

Map dormant wealth

Identify wallets still controlled by their original owners
Detect pockets of undeclared wealth

Trigger revealing behaviors

Simply moving the funds = proof of control
Link an old wallet to an active entity (via bounce addresses, KYC, timing)

Prepare a legal recovery framework

Funds framed as abandoned or tied to illicit activity
Enable seizures, court orders, and tax enforcement actions

Analyzed Front Structure:

Salomon Brothers Strategic Advisors Inc. = operative legal shell
EisnerAmper address = governmental anchoring point
Legally clean infrastructure with no real economic activity

His strategic conclusion:

“This operation is a large-scale test of identification and reactivation techniques for dormant assets. It’s a controlled, state-driven signal — potentially replicable.”

Cryptographic Context – IssamSatoshi’s PQC Thread

June 30: The Prophetic Warning

While I was still unsettled by the Salomon Brothers statement and the growing scale (+17k BTC dormant of 2019), @IssamSatoshi published a thread that, in retrospect, sheds crucial light on the underlying cryptographic stakes.

“Cryptocalypse. The European Union requires all critical infrastructure to adopt post-quantum encryption by 2030. Why this deadline is strategic and why we should already care.”

🗂️ PQC Thread

The Temporal Vulnerabilities Revealed

His timeline-based analysis was particularly striking:

“Europol, Germany’s BSI, and other agencies estimate a 10-to-15-year horizon before credible offensive quantum capabilities emerge. Classical cryptography (RSA, ECC) will then become obsolete for long-term security.”

Two major approaches emerge:

PQC (Post-Quantum Cryptography): classical algorithms resistant to quantum attacks
QKD (Quantum Key Distribution): quantum-state key transmission

The EU clearly favors PQC for its compatibility and scalability.

🔮 Quantum Evolution : BlackRock anticipates the future of Bitcoin

The Core Technical Challenge: Cryptographic Agility

IssamSatoshi pinpointed a crucial issue:

“The central technical challenge: cryptographic agility — designing systems where algorithms can be swapped without reengineering the entire architecture. Seamless transition from RSA/ECC to PQC is essential.”

What the EU Is Actually Demanding

His breakdown of the EU’s requirements shows the scale of the transition:

Full mapping of all cryptographic usage
Adoption of modular crypto libraries
PQC pilot programs
Certification, training, inter-state coordination
10-year monitored transition strategy

“Every entity, public or private, must now: identify cryptographic usage points, assess quantum vulnerability, plan the PQC transition, benchmark performance, adapt architecture.”

The Impact on Bitcoin and Blockchains

The most revealing part for our investigation:

“For builders and protocol designers: Current primitives (ECDSA, SHA-2, Curve25519…) are not designed to resist Shor’s algorithm. Whatever you encrypt, sign, or anchor on a blockchain must evolve.”

See the excellent interview with Marius from Cryptoast: 🗂️ Cryptoast Interview

Bitcoin uses exactly those vulnerable primitives.

The Crucial Time-Based Warning

IssamSatoshi issued a warning that now feels eerily aligned with our case:

“To anticipate now is to avoid double jeopardy:

Data encrypted today gets harvested
Infrastructure becomes obsolete and vulnerable tomorrow”*

And most importantly:

“Passive collection of encrypted data has already begun.”

The Troubling Timing

That thread was posted on June 30, exactly 4 days before the 80k BTC moved on July 4. It now resonates heavily, as IssamSatoshi was already alerting about:

Current cryptographic vulnerabilities
The urgent need for transition
The fact that “passive encrypted data collection has already started”

My Reflection:

What if the 80k BTC are only the visible symptom of a large-scale exploitation of historical Bitcoin cryptographic weaknesses?

Techniques like lattice attacks on biased ECDSA nonces may only be the tip of the iceberg in a cryptographic arms race that has already begun.

The Geostrategic Context

The thread also highlights a major geostrategic issue:

“What’s at stake is the long-term viability of confidentiality, integrity, and proof in the quantum era.”

In this context, an operation like the 80k BTC movement could fit within a preventive security logic, anticipating the democratization of these techniques — or their eventual misuse by malicious actors.

The Technical Revelation: The Nonce K Bug Decoded

Growing External Recognition

As my investigation deepens, I receive unexpected support from @GRM_Web3, who publicly acknowledges my work:

“Honestly, I don’t know how many of you truly grasp this whole story around the 80,000 BTC. I’m trying with help from ChatGPT o3 and @Cyphertux, and even then, I have to admit it’s not easy if you don’t have a technical background and/or a deep knowledge of Bitcoin.

So first of all, bravo and thank you to him for the work he’s doing — it feels like he’s the only one (or almost) doing it!”

This external validation confirms what I’ve felt from the beginning: I really am the only one conducting a full-scale technical investigation into this case.

⚠️ The “Nonce k” Bug That Endangers Bitcoin Wallets

To help the broader public understand the magnitude of this exploit, I decided to explain — in simplified terms — the technical mechanism behind it. This breakdown is crucial to grasp how serious the threat really is.

1. The Fundamental Principle

If two Bitcoin transactions are signed using the same secret nonce “k” (which causes the same “r” to appear in both ECDSA signatures), enough information is leaked to reconstruct the private key → anyone can then drain the wallet.

2. What Researchers Have Found

The scale of the issue is staggering:

647 million signatures scanned from the blockchain
1,068 nonce collisions detected
2,537 private keys reconstructed, exposing 533 BTC (≈ $61M)

3. Why Does This Happen?

Multiple causes reveal systemic vulnerabilities:

Improperly initialized RNG (e.g., Android bug from 2013, cloned VMs…)
Hardcoded nonces left in by mistake after testing (k = 1, 0x12345678…)
Fee-saving shortcuts: k = n/2 became a bad habit

4. How the Attack Works in Practice

The process is terrifyingly simple:

Monitor new Bitcoin transactions
Detect if a reused “r” appears
Compute the private key in 1 ms
Move the funds before the transaction is even confirmed

The Key Revelation: Why Now?

The most crucial part of my analysis answers the question: Why is this exploit surfacing in 2025?

AI democratizes the impossible:

“Open-source tools (KeyHunt-CUDA, BitCrack…) driven by AI scripts now scan the mempool in real time; as soon as the same “r” reappears, the private key is computed within seconds — even on a gaming PC.”

The Temporal Trigger:

March 18, 2025: A BitcoinTalk user opens the thread “P2PKH Address Pairs with Reused Nonce k”
They link directly to the 2018 PDF that had initially exposed the bug, bringing the vulnerability back into the spotlight
Snowball effect: blog posts, rumors of “Bitcoin cracked by AI”

Critical Democratization:

“The weakness has existed since 2014, but the public availability of AI tools + a reminder on BitcoinTalk suddenly made it much more visible — and accessible.”

What Could Happen Next

My prediction is proving prophetic:

“The exploit is now public: teams around the world will start doing the same — scanning the blockchain, identifying reused nonce ‘r’ values, recomputing private keys, and draining wallets.”

👉 This is turning into a global race against time.

The Dormant Bitcoin Ecosystem

The most alarming observation I have is the inaction from the community:

“No network alert, no BIP, no fix. Three options:

Either the devs are on vacation
Or they are writing their own scripts to hunt private keys
Or they haven’t understood what’s happening.

None of these are reassuring.”

The Crucial Technical Distinction

I conclude with a fundamental clarification:

“This is not a “hack,” it’s an exploit.”

A hack = breaking the protocol
An exploit = taking advantage of human error (in this case: reusing the same nonce “k”)

Bitcoin remains mathematically sound; it’s the usage that’s flawed.”

The Major Insight

This technical analysis reveals that the 80k BTC case is part of a larger context of cryptographic exploits democratized by AI. What previously required advanced cryptographic skills and significant resources is now accessible to “anyone with a gaming PC” and AI scripts.

My realization: The 80k BTC is probably just the visible part of a larger wave of systematic exploitations made possible by this technological democratization.

Technical Dive – Lattice Attacks and Vulnerable RNGs

🕵️‍♂️ Biased Nonce Sense: The Academic Foundation

After exploring the cryptographic context established by IssamSatoshi, I begin digging into the specific technical aspects. My first major discovery: the paper “Biased Nonce Sense: Lattice Attacks against Weak ECDSA Signatures in Cryptocurrencies” (https://eprint.iacr.org/2019/023.pdf).

This 2019 academic paper reveals sophisticated techniques to exploit biased ECDSA nonces in cryptocurrencies. The timing of this publication, 6 years before the 80k BTC case, suggests these techniques were already known and potentially used.

The PS3 Precedent: When k Becomes Constant

The analogy with the PlayStation 3 hack strikes me:

“The case of the fixed k number serves as a poignant reminder of the critical role randomness plays in cryptographic processes. Sony’s oversight, transforming k from a variable into a constant, led to a cascading sequence of events, ultimately unraveling the PS3’s fortress-like security.”

The parallel is striking: A fixed k (constant) instead of a random k was enough to completely compromise the PS3’s security. If a constant k can destroy the security of a console, what about biased k’s or predictable RNG patterns on Bitcoin?

🗂️ console_hacking_2010.pdf

Post-Quantum and BIP360: The Temporal Urgency

I then discover BIP360 (https://bip360.org/) and the NIST’s post-quantum algorithms, confirming IssamSatoshi’s analysis. The convergence of timelines becomes clear:

2030: EU deadline for post-quantum transition
2025: Massive exploitation of current vulnerabilities
“Q-Day” RSA 2048 broken by 2030, according to LinkedIn analyses

My realization: We are in the critical window where classical techniques are still vulnerable, but quantum capabilities aren’t fully operational yet. This is the perfect time to exploit historical cryptographic weaknesses.

🚨 Expanding the Temporal Scope: Not Just Pre-2015

A major discovery that changes everything:

“💥 You thought only Bitcoin wallets generated before 2015 were vulnerable? ❌ Think again. Even in 2019, some users were still creating wallets with outdated methods.”

The study I found reveals that even after 2018, some environments still suffered from:

Weak or improperly initialized RNGs
Vulnerable versions of Electrum in circulation
Poorly generated seeds
Too-simple brainwallets

What this means clearly:

➡️ It’s not the wallet creation year that matters

➡️ It’s the method used

“You could have a wallet created in 2019 as vulnerable as a 2013 wallet if the seed came from a too-simple brainwallet, the app used a faulty RNG, or the user reused an old online script.”

💣 Modern Treasure Hunting: Exploiting History

My theoretical reflection on modern attacks reveals an unsettling truth:

“And what if the real Bitcoin exploit was never in the math… but in the way some wallets were generated? Old wallet.dat files might hide silent time bombs. Treasure hunters in 2025 don’t break encryption – they break history.”

🧠 What a smart attacker would do in 2025:

Scrape all leaked wallet.dat files (darknet, old dumps)
List all Bitcoin Core/Electrum versions with generation bugs
Target those using weak RNGs or unencrypted storage
Brute-force only these versions with known patterns

💡 The crucial insight:

“This is modern treasure hunting, no need to break encryption. Just exploit the bugs of the past.”

✅ What an Attacker Really Needs

My list reveals the terrifying simplicity of the attack:

A predictable generation method (seed, brainwallet, broken RNG)
A Bitcoin address database (easy with public indexers)
A correspondence table (seed → address)
An alert when an address has a balance
A private key retrieved off-chain → 💸 sweep to a controlled wallet

🔚 The uncomfortable truth:

“The attack doesn’t rely on cracking encryption. It bypasses it by targeting how wallets were originally generated. If you can reproduce the generation method, you can rediscover the private key without ever seeing a signature.”

💡 No transaction needed. No key revealed. Just pure off-chain reverse engineering.

⚠️ The Ultimate Scenario

“Now imagine this: An elite team with a full archive of old wallet.dat files, a list of all vulnerable wallet versions, a powerful GPU cluster, and even basic quantum hardware (Grover-based search). Suddenly, seeds once safe for 10,000 years… collapse to days or hours.”

They don’t need 1,000,000 qubits. They just need history to have made one mistake, once.

CVE-2025-2780: The Mysterious Vulnerability

At the end of the section, I mention a troubling reference: CVE-2025-2780 (https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/cve-2025-27840). This 2025 CVE suggests that critical vulnerabilities are still being discovered in real-time.

⚡️ For more ECDSA Cracking Methods (April 9, 2025) : https://arxiv.org/html/2504.07265v1

🔐 The Moral of the Story

“Your wallet.dat is only as strong as the moment it was born. And time doesn’t forgive bad entropy.”

This section reveals that the 80k BTC case is part of a larger context of systematic exploitation of cryptographic history. Lattice attacks against biased nonces, combined with historical weak RNGs and predictable generation patterns, create a much larger arsenal of exploits than just nonce reuse.

Critical Technical Combinations

🔍 The Critical Threshold Revealed by jacky19790729

After establishing the technical foundation, I uncover a crucial insight in the Bitcointalk discussions. The user jacky19790729 specifies the exact limits of lattice attacks:

✅ k ≤ 252 bits: lattice attack possible

❌ k > 252 bits: “matrices too dense”

This major technical revelation precisely defines the vulnerability threshold. Nonces generated with less than 252 bits of entropy become exploitable via lattice attacks, while those above this threshold remain resistant.

Full Academic Validation

The paper by Christian Rossow (https://christian-rossow.de/publications/btcsteal-raid2018.pdf) fully confirms my hypotheses:

✅ ECDSA techniques → Used on Bitcointalk

✅ Bipartite graphs → Mentioned by jacky19790729

✅ Weak nonces → k=1, k=12345678 (JohnnyTX patterns)

✅ Blockchain scanner → OP_RETURN-based methodology

✅ 412 BTC potential → Scale comparable to the 80k BTC

The convergence between my empirical discoveries and this 2018 academic research is deeply unsettling. These techniques were documented seven years ago, but never weaponized at this scale — until now.

🔍🕵️‍♂️ Major Discovery: JohnnyTX and Puzzle #130

My most unsettling discovery emerged while analyzing the Bitcointalk archives. On July 29, 2024, a mysterious user named JohnnyTX published two cryptographic signatures:

Signature 1: A basic message (“This is test 4”)
Signature 2: Claims to sign “Private key for Puzzle #130” as the message

The Disturbing Timing

✅ JohnnyTX post date: July 29, 2024

✅ Official solution of Puzzle #130: September 2024

⚠️ Gap: JohnnyTX had the solution two months early

The Parallel With the 80k BTC

This revelation echoes my 80k BTC analysis in a disturbing way:

🤔 Striking Similarities:

Pre-knowledge: Like JohnnyTX with Puzzle #130, someone had access to “impossible” private keys
Suspicious timing: Both events suggest long, methodical preparation
Hidden vulnerabilities: Exploited flaws in nonce generation seem to connect both cases

(Let me repeat for clarity — this is not a tutorial. Do your own research — it’s not that hard.)

The Financial Stakes

Puzzle #130: $1 million reward
80k BTC (July 2025): $8 billion in motion

Same pattern, different magnitude.

The Unsettling Question

jacky19790729 asks the critical question:

“why z2 will be Private key for Puzzle #130 ??”

Translation: How could JohnnyTX sign with a key he wasn’t supposed to know?

This question directly resonates with mine:

How could 80k Satoshi-era BTC move after 14 years of dormancy?

Converging Hypotheses

🧩 For Puzzle #130:

JohnnyTX = future solver (with prior knowledge)
RNG vulnerability discovered
Lattice attack techniques mastered before the public

💰 For the 80k BTC:

Legitimate recovery of lost wallets
Exploitation of Randstorm-era (2011–2015) vulnerabilities
Systematic cracking of biased nonces

🔐 The Revealed Impact on Bitcoin Security

Both events expose an uncomfortable truth:

Sophisticated actors already master preemptive cracking techniques
Historical ECDSA vulnerabilities are still exploitable at scale
The line between “recovery” and “theft” is sometimes dangerously thin

Historical Documentation

This screenshot from Bitcointalk may document one of the first public proofs that an actor possessed advanced cryptographic capabilities long before they became widely known.

Coupled with the massive movement of ancient BTC, it paints the picture of an ecosystem where some actors have mastered techniques the wider community is only now beginning to understand.

My Final Realization

Bitcoin cryptography resists mathematics — but history always catches up.

These technical findings have reshaped my entire understanding of the case. This is no longer a series of isolated coincidences — but rather converging proof of a systematic exploitation of historical cryptographic weaknesses, conducted by actors who have mastered these techniques for months, if not years.

The JohnnyTX / Puzzle #130 case proves that in July 2024, a full year before the 80k BTC were moved, advanced cryptographic capabilities were already operational — and tested publicly.

Here is my final thesis — the one I now consider most likely after all my discoveries:

The Six-Phase Orchestration Revealed

My analysis exposes an operation composed of six distinct phases over several months. Each phase reflects a level of planning and execution that surpasses anything the crypto space has ever seen.

Phase 1 – Discovery (March–June 2025): The Arsenal Assembles

Between March and June 2025, Bitcointalk becomes a stage for critical technical revelations.

JohnnyTX — already flagged for his eerie foresight with Puzzle #130 — appears again.

The papers by coolmib and RSZ-based tools emerge.

This phase marks the testbed: techniques are validated, tooling finalized. The arsenal — both theoretical and practical — is now ready.

(I won’t link to sensitive material here, but for the curious: dig around — many doors are close by 👀)

Phase 2 – Crack (RNG 2011–2015): The Lock Breaks

Systematic exploitation of RNG vulnerabilities from the 2011–2015 period begins.

The dump methods and lattice attacks I documented break the first layer.

Once predictable RNG patterns are identified, what was a single-shot exploit becomes scalable.

This is the “you just broke the game” moment — suddenly, a million addresses become potentially computable.

Phase 3 – Strategic Selection: Calculated Targeting

The selection of the 8 wallets is not random.

My analysis reveals refined strategy: intelligent scanning, targeting of two specific clusters, deliberate avoidance of Satoshi wallets (too sensitive), and likely identification of owners without key access.

Control is gained before any movement becomes visible.

Phase 4 – Camouflage (July 1–3): Smoke and Mirrors

The OP_RETURN spam I analyzed in my first report now makes full sense.

The objective: to obfuscate the true nature of the operation and set up an incredibly sophisticated legal cover.

At first, I thought the defense might be: “I recovered my broken wallet.dat files.”

But it’s much more Machiavellian.

The Salomon Brothers statement reveals a calculated legal strategy.

The actor presents themselves as a philanthropic white hat:

”…represents a client who has identified digital wallets that appear abandoned and therefore may be at risk of an attack by a bad actor.”

But this benevolent tone hides a legal endgame.

By using terms like “abandoned wallets” and referencing a 90-day deadline, the actor sets the stage to invoke New York State’s Unclaimed Funds Law.

Their ultimate defense?

“I followed New York State’s legal procedure for unclaimed funds. I gave a 90-day notice as required by law. I notified the wallet owners via OP_RETURN. I even created a recovery fund. I simply fulfilled my due diligence as defined by NY OSC’s procedures.”

With that, the exploit becomes legally compliant.

This actor could even set legal precedent by extending that law to crypto assets.

The soothing tone of the statement — “Our client would not knowingly take any action that would adversely impact the crypto market” — is a clear attempt to avoid scrutiny while prepping for a brilliant legal defense.

Think about it: what would you do in their place?

They’re playing with semantics: it’s not a “hack” — it’s a legally justified exploit under existing statutes.

The level of legal sophistication here is simply staggering.

Phase 5 – Parallel Discovery (July 1, afternoon): The Synchronicity Signal

JimsR posts his question on Bitcointalk on the exact same day the OP_RETURN spam begins — just hours later. This synchronicity is not a coincidence.

He probably received the messages and began his own investigation — just like I did that very morning when I dove into the security implications. 😭

It proves that other OGs and detectives were starting to figure it out — and still are.

Phase 6 – Execution (July 4 – Independence Day): Symbolic Genius

The choice of July 4th was no accident.

This is pure psychological strategy — to make it look like a real OG panicked and rushed to move their funds.

The market stayed calm, no panic.

Avoiding the Satoshi wallets shows media awareness and narrative control.

And still, I remain the only one investigating this seriously.

Remember the paradox of the lost keys I exposed in Part I.

Smart Technical Innovation

What I’ve uncovered is the first industrial-scale hack through broken RNG patterns. Like the PS3 ECDSA breach, what once seemed impossible is now real. The sophistication is threefold:

Technical (lattice attacks)
Legal (Salomon Brothers framework)
Psychological (symbolic timing)

The cover story — “legitimate recovery” — is executed to perfection.

The Hidden Colossal Impact

$8 billion quietly recovered. A 90-day countdown now ticking — with a deadline of October 5 that we all understand. And yet, Cyphertux.net appears to be the only site that cracked the full mystery. JimsR’s post marked the first synchronous alert. Bitcointalk is the smoking gun of the operation’s premeditation.

The Ultimate Sophistication Achieved

The triple camouflage is flawless:

Technical: OP_RETURN spam
Legal: “lost funds” and “compliance with NY law”
Psychological: the panicked OG illusion

The cluster selection was calculated. The July 4th date? Pure narrative genius. The obfuscation worked. And I may still be the only serious investigator on this story. Or perhaps, are they hiding the truth from us? Do all the OGs already know?

My Final Reflection

Above all, this remains just a thesis. A thesis built on weeks of investigation, but a thesis nonetheless. I’ve deliberately avoided detailing the precise technical exploit and tools required. But know this: it’s accessible to anyone — and that’s precisely what’s so alarming. With AI tools like Claude or GPT, you now have excellent coding companions. You need to know how to steer them, sure — but it’s within reach for all. The democratization of these techniques fundamentally changes the game.

The Questions That Remain

Now we need to think. No one holds the absolute truth yet, of course. However, all the elements I’ve gathered push me to believe we’re living through a major moment — one that very few people are truly aware of.

If this is real, how will the “client” proceed from here? Is it just one person, or were those incredible Bitcointalk exchanges between three individuals part of it? Will we ever truly know the identity of the client (my gut says it’s a single person)? Was this entire plan orchestrated and premeditated to unfold as smoothly as possible — especially in the eyes of the community?

Do you believe this was done with good intentions? Do you think another team might still pull off the exploit before the October 5 deadline? Could it even be Satoshi himself? 👀

There’s every reason to believe we’ll see more significant movements very soon — I feel this almost as a certainty.

The Alternative Hypothesis

Ask yourself the hard question. Consider every possible explanation. Maybe it’s just the original OG wallet owner, finally taking the threats seriously after 14 years of inactivity. For years, many have tried to claim ownership of these wallets — Craig Wright, among others. But if you were the one executing the exploit, choosing these wallets is an incredibly smart move. I would’ve done the same. Though in my case, if the funds ended up in France, I imagine the legal framework would be far more complex. And once all of this is laid out — you start to understand that if I pulled this off, who gets the treasure in the end? The state? That’s rough.

This Is Just the Beginning

This story is far from over. Those saying “move along, nothing to see here” aren’t being serious in light of the evidence. One thing is certain: we must take every threat seriously — and this is a threat — to anyone willing to look deeper and connect the dots.

The investigation continues.

See this : Wallet Satoshi era comes back 2013, no OP_RETURN you say ?

Idem for understanding the phenomenon of magnitude : Big move Satoshi Era 17k BTC

Here is a thesis to read from @HenriGauthier

Full investigation led by @Cyphertux – Bitcoin Digital Archaeology

BitcoinECDSASecurityRNGExploit