Features | A CIA Agent Once Bought Bitcoin Just to Show Off to His Boss
At a 2011 technology conference held by In-Q-Tel (IQT), a Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) agent bought 1 Bitcoin (BTC) from Gavin Andresen, a leading Bitcoin developer. Interestingly, this purchase wasn't made for covert purposes but rather so the agent could show off Bitcoin to his superiors. At the time, Bitcoin was valued at around $15 per coin. Gavin had brought several Bitbills, physical representations of Bitcoin, as examples to the event, which was attended by representatives from PayPal, Facebook, and the Federal Reserve (The Fed).
"I showed him the Bitbills I brought, and he said it was cool and wanted to buy one to show his boss," Gavin said in a podcast. This moment highlights how decentralized technology like Bitcoin can penetrate the bureaucratic walls of intelligence agencies, even when the technology is still very new and often associated with dark market imagery. If the agent still holds the Bitcoin, its value at the time of writing would be around $95,000, representing a 600,000% increase.
