A 2019 MacBook Pro is going through the Smithsonian's National Numerical Collection to find and capture $3.6 billion worth of bitcoins stolen from cryptocurrency exchange Bitfin. At the time, a Justice Department press release said the recovery of the stolen BTC was “the largest financial bust ever.”
The purpose of the National Numerical Collection (NNC) is to record historical developments related to the monetary system of the United States. According to Ellen Feingold, head of the collection, the laptop captures a “shift” in public knowledge of bitcoin tracking.
As such, the laptop has been installed in the Smithsonian's “Value for Money” gallery alongside seashells, tea, stones, silver and gold. Feingold herself looks like the MacBook Pro is out of place first — at least at first glance.
“To me, the laptop, contextualized in various forms of money over the past four thousand years, and the cryptocurrency it represents, seem far from the past and instead a continuum that defines and redefines the value of human beings with the world around them,” the chief wrote in Smithsonian Magazine.
On Monday, Heather Morgan—also known by her rap alias “Razilcan”—was sentenced to 18 months in prison for her role in the 2016 Bitfinex hack. Prosecutors recommended a lighter sentence compared to her husband, Ilia Lichtenstein, who stole Morgan's 119,000 BTC in 2016 and asked Morgan to wash it years later.
Just last week, Lichtenstein was sentenced to five years in prison.
In the year In 2016, there were many myths about cryptocurrency and Bitcoin that were entrenched in the public consciousness. One of them was that the bitcoin was untraceable and completely untraceable – but the IRS's seizure of the stolen BTC proved otherwise.
IRS Criminal Investigation Special Agent Chris Janczewski used the aforementioned 2019 MacBook Pro to track funds in the blockchain. The agent then managed to identify the criminals after transferring the money to several exchanges. This led to a search of their home. That's where detectives found the keys to the wallets that contained most of the stolen money.
Aside from the eye-watering amount of the loot, the case has attracted a lot of public attention because of the personality of the perpetrators.
Mostly, this is due to Morgan's real career as an internet rapper under the alias Razilkan. Her songs include “Revolutionary Spirit, Dictator's Power” and “Do You Really Want to Talk?” Ever since I was 15, I've always run the guilt game.
Nicknamed “Bitcoin's Bonnie and Clyde,” several major streaming services have announced plans to retell their story in upcoming documentaries. But this is not a key list for the Smithsonian.
“To me, the real story is how. [this] Case will help change our perception of cryptocurrency from an anonymous to a pseudo-anonymous method of exchange,” explained Feingled. “Most people can still use cryptocurrency to make transactions without sharing their details with their families and banks, but criminals cannot rely on cryptocurrencies to hide their crimes and protect themselves from prosecution.”
Edited by Stacy Elliott.
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