• jballs@sh.itjust.works
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    2 days ago

    Would’ve been hilarious if, in true AI fashion, it deleted his wallet immediately after recovering the password.

  • GrayBackgroundMusic@lemmy.zip
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    2 days ago

    I know nothing of crypto. What’s wallet.dat? Why does it help in this situation? What could Claude Ai have done to help figure out the pw?

    • Zetta@mander.xyz
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      2 days ago

      "However, the breakthrough reportedly came when he uploaded files from his old college computer into Claude.

      Rather than simply guessing the password, Claude helped dig through the old files and identify an older wallet.dat file that appeared to predate the password change. The user also reportedly had an old mnemonic phrase, which helped unlock the wallet once the correct file was found."

      • GrayBackgroundMusic@lemmy.zip
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        2 days ago

        Yeah, I saw that but I was trying to get more detail. None of that makes sense to me. Why did a wallet.dat file help? How did the mnemonic phrase help? I literally have zero context for crypto.

        • blackbeans@lemmy.zip
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          2 days ago

          Well, in crypto all your assets are on the blockchain. But you can access them using wallet software. You can have multiple addresses that have a balance, and most of the time anyone can see those balances, as the ledger is synchronized and transactions are checked by all clients. However, in order to access and send the money, you will need proof that you are the owner. Therefore every address had a keypair. In older desktop clients, there was a local file called wallet.dat which stored all of the owned wallet addresses and their private keys. That file could optionally be encrypted. Newer clients often use a mnemonic phrase and derives the keys for the addresses based on that phrase, but the person in question still had the original wallet.dat, even unencrypted, meaning he could access the keys all along.

        • ParlimentOfDoom@piefed.zip
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          2 days ago

          Apparently an old file had his previous password in plaintext… The AI just searched through a ton of files and found it, I guess.

          • MadPsyentist@lemmy.nz
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            2 days ago

            The llm found the file that was encrypted with an older password that the guy could remember. The llm didnt decrypt anything or find a vulnrability, it just found an older fill the guy could unlock and he gained access to his bitcoin wallet that way.

        • ftbd@feddit.org
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          2 days ago

          ELI5: The guy thought he’d lost his keys, but had a spare in another jacket all along

  • etherphon@piefed.world
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    2 days ago

    Meh I think the time has more to do than the weed, I’m a lifetime smoker and I wouldn’t forget the password to hundreds of thousands of dollars that’s just stupid.

    • boonhet@sopuli.xyz
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      1 day ago

      I mean at the time it would’ve been more like 2 grand I believe?

      Still too much for me to forget a password

  • lluq@feddit.org
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    2 days ago

    I have only one question: did recovering the password involve getting high and then using Claude Code?

  • [object Object]@sh.itjust.works
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    2 days ago

    Rather than simply guessing the password, Claude helped dig through the old files and identify an older wallet.dat file that appeared to predate the password change. The user also reportedly had an old mnemonic phrase, which helped unlock the wallet once the correct file was found.

    The password, as later revealed in the post, was: “lol420fuckthePOLICE!*:)”