A bloke who is sitting on a crypto-currency fortune of £200 million is unable to access his dosh after forgetting his password.
Stefan Thomas lost a piece of paper containing his password a decade ago and since then has been completely unable to access his fortune. Talk about bad luck, eh?
The German-born investor was paid 7,002 Bitcoin back in 2011 and his stash is now worth £189,905,495 - however, it’s locked away in an IronKey password protected hard drive which gives him just 10 attempts to correctly enter his password; Stefan has already used eight.
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Stefan now has just two chances left before his millions are lost forever and has been left devastated by the turn of events.
Speaking to Berliner Zeitung, he said: "I was absolutely desperate. I couldn't sleep for nights. I even suffered from depression.
"But much worse than the loss of the money was my self-reproach: I simply couldn't believe I had lost something so important. I felt like a complete idiot, my self-esteem was in the basement."
Opening up about the media attention his unfortunate plight has attracted, Stefan said: "There were smart Alecs or jokers who asked me: have you tried 'password'?
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"And I've received all kinds of bizarre offers: several people with so-called channeling abilities contacted me and also a 'prophet' from Croatia.
"On the other hand, there were also some technology experts and data recovery companies who offered me support."
Stefan, who admits to feeling ‘like an idiot’, is still hopeful that he could reclaim his fortune and he has a plan to do it.
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"You would have to take the USB stick apart and then remove the chip itself layer by layer using a scanning electron microscope,” he explained.
“This would allow you to read out the individual flash memory cells.
"But that's incredibly time-consuming: you need a laboratory and experts, and everything costs a lot of money. And the result is very uncertain."
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Despite the unfortunate situation, Stefan is determined to not let it ruin his life and has even bought more Bitcoin.
He went on: "It must go on. So I went back to doing what I really wanted. And what had always motivated me was to write software that helps people.
"I threw myself back into programming. When I had a permanent job again, I bought new Bitcoins. I still have them today."
Topics: Cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, Money, Business, World News
Claire Reid