Introduction
There are some steps you can take to recover your stolen Bitcoin. It might seem like the Wild West of Bitcoin has seen its last days and that the crypto world has finally quieted down. But while it’s true that the number of scams and hacks has dropped, they still happen quite frequently.
It’s not as if recovering stolen bitcoin is easy, either; you won’t be able to call up customer service, explain your situation, and get them to send back what was lost. In this guide, however, we’ll walk you through exactly how to get your money back—and maybe even have some fun in the process.
How bitcoin exchanges are using police data to help victims recover stolen funds
If you’re one of the unfortunate victims of a bitcoin exchange fraud, there are steps you can take to recover your stolen funds.
Bitcoin exchanges such as Coinbase and Gemini have been working with police departments to help some victims recover stolen funds. This process involves using a government database called LexisNexis Accurint to trace transactions back to their perpetrators.
Don’t just have a password: Make the password complex, difficult for hackers to guess, and don’t re-use passwords across multiple accounts.
It’s not enough to simply have a password, you also need to make sure it’s complex and difficult for hackers to guess.
- Don’t re-use passwords across multiple accounts, especially if they’re connected with each other. That means that if you use the same password for your email account as you do for your social media profiles, watch out! If one of those gets hacked, all of them are vulnerable.
- Make the password complex: The longer the better—at least 12 characters and preferably more than 10. It should contain upper case letters, lower case letters, numbers and symbols (such as !@#$%^&*()_+[]{}:;_?). Don’t forget about capitalization either—it helps make words harder to crack by confusing hackers’ software programs which are programmed only to recognize lower case letters at first glance!
Two-factor authentication is handy if you have a single point of failure but it doesn’t do much good if someone gets into your email and removes the authenticator app from your account.
Two-factor authentication (2FA) is an extra layer of protection that you can use to protect your account from hackers and phishing attacks. It’s also handy if you have a single point of failure: for example, if someone gets into your email and removes the authenticator app from your account, they’ll still have to answer security questions before having access to your funds.
While 2FA isn’t guaranteed to prevent theft, it does add another step for someone trying to get into an account. If they’re using stolen credentials or other information like IP address details or hardware IDs, then they’ll be blocked by this additional layer of security until they provide a valid code generated by the device that is associated with their account (your phone).
Use a cold/offline wallet.
The next step is to use a cold wallet. A cold wallet is an offline storage device, such as a USB stick, that you can keep in your home or office.
It’s more secure than storing Bitcoin online because it doesn’t depend on the internet and therefore can’t be hacked. You should consider using this method if you intend to store Bitcoin for long-term savings or want to keep your holdings safe from hackers and thieves (or both).
Keep your transaction private.
The most important tip is to keep your transaction private. Using a wallet that is not connected to the internet, doesn’t have a connection to your identity and doesn’t have a connection to your home address or phone number will help ensure that only you know where the money is stored.
If you must use an online wallet, try using one that differs from other cryptocurrency exchanges with which you interact (for example, Coinbase).
If hackers can steal information from one exchange, they may be able to gain access elsewhere as well. Also avoid well-known exchanges with high traffic and large amounts of money stored on their servers.
You can use Bitcoin Core or Electrum wallet and connect to the Tor network.
The first step to recovering your stolen bitcoin, if you have a wallet that is not connected to the internet, is to access it and make sure that the bitcoins are still there.
If they are gone, then you must use another wallet with a different private key or consider other options like hiring someone who specializes in these kinds of cases.
There are many ways this can be done depending on what type of wallet you have. But no matter what kind of wallet you use, make sure it isn’t connected to the internet for security reasons before attempting this method!
If your Bitcoin Core or Electrum wallets are not connected to the internet and still contain bitcoin then proceed as follows:
You can recover your stolen Bitcoin
Even if you don’t want to deal with the hassle of filing a police report, there are some steps you can take to recover your stolen Bitcoin.
First, it’s important to know that there is no guarantee of recovery. This process involves doing things that are illegal in most countries and may put you at risk of being arrested or worse; however, if you’re willing to accept these risks, here’s what you need to do:
- Use an offline wallet (like [Bitcoin Core](https://bitcoin.org/en/bitcoin-core/)). These are wallets that keep all their data locally on your computer or phone and do not communicate with any other computers over the internet—in other words, they’re completely offline and don’t rely on balance information from any exchanges or web wallets like Coinbase or Blockchain. You’ll have access to all your private keys with this method as long as they aren’t connected online anywhere else; this means that even if someone steals them from another device then tries logging into one of those sites using them again later down the road after getting caught red handed by law enforcement officials (which would happen only if they were careless enough not covering their tracks first), they won’t find any useful information because none exists!
- Hire a professional to ease your way through your stolen bitcoin recovery. Cyb3rdroid simplifies the process of fund recovery, all you have to do is to share details your have about your wallet or whatever you might have perceived is the reason why you cannot find your bitcoin. They have been able to recover millions of lost bitcoin.
Conclusion
Fortunately, some exchanges are trying to help their customers recover stolen Bitcoin. They are using sophisticated technology and data to trace transactions and find stolen coins.
The companies use blockchain forensics tools, they talk to the police, they scan darknet markets for unusual activity, and even hire private investigators if needed.
All these efforts will help you get back your hard-earned money if you have the knowledge about cryptocurrency and know how to safely store it in your wallet.