The story of the programmer who forgot his digital wallet: James Howells and the loss of 8,000 Bitcoins
In 2009, James Howells was working as a technical engineer and programmer in Newport, UK. At the time, Bitcoin was in its infancy, and no one was paying much attention to it, but Howells decided to mine a few using an old laptop.
The defining event: Selling the computer by mistake
After mining approximately 8,000 bitcoins, he stored the private keys to his digital wallet on an external hard drive. In 2013, he accidentally threw away the drive while cleaning his office, believing it contained nothing important.
At the time, Bitcoin wasn't worth much, but just a few years later, it skyrocketed to over $60,000 per coin at times, making the lost wallet worth over $480 million!
Howells Today: Trying to Recover Wealth
Since then, Howells has been fighting with the Newport City Council to obtain a permit to search the local landfill, where he believes the hard drive remains buried. He has offered millions of dollars if he can recover it and has even hired companies specializing in excavation and artificial intelligence to pinpoint the hard drive's exact location.
More than a decade later, Howells still hopes to recover his digital wallet, and his story has become a global lesson about the importance of securing private keys.
Digital currencies.