Meet The Two Alleged Bitfinex Hackers: Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan

The recovery of the stolen BTC from the 2016 Bitfinex hack was the news of the day. That story’s protagonists, though, they’re legends in the making. You can already tell that Ilya Lichtenstein and Heather Morgan will live forever in meme form. The story is so unlikely that many people in the Bitcoin community are doubtful that it happened as reported. Related Reading | Bitcoin Stolen From Bitfinex Hack Moved For The First Time In Five Years Could this tech entrepreneur and this writer/ rapper have hacked a cryptocurrency exchange? Or are they just the money launderers for a bigger operation? And, did they really save the private keys to billions in BTC on the cloud? Or were they set up? Is law enforcement playing tricks on the public or are they the heroes of the day? Imagine being a hacker (or money launderer) and keeping the unencrypted private keys to $3.5billion of #Bitcoin in an online account linked to your name Mind blown 🤯 — Alistair Milne (@alistairmilne) February 8, 2022 We can’t answer those questions at the moment. What we can do is explore the Bitfinex hackers’ social media to get a sense of who they are. But first, a summary. What’s The Bitfinex Hack All About? And, Why Is It Relevant Now? The “Statement Of Facts” available at the justice.gov website does a good job setting the stage: “In or around August 2016, a hacker breached Victim VCE’s security systems and infiltrated its infrastructure. ...