In 2021 New York Times online published an article about Stefan Thomas a San Francisco programmer who got locked out of his 7002 Bitcoin fortune because he could not remember the password to his digital wallet. I remember reading the article so fast and with each sentence I had an "oh no" exclamation and a sinking feeling in my gut. What a tragedy? I think I kind of sweated too 😄, I mean of all the things that can happen to anyone in crypto, this is the worst, worst of them all. 

The story is, Stefan Thomas locked his hard drive containing 7002 Bitcoin with an Ironkey and wrote the password on a piece of paper. Unfortunately the piece of paper got lost. He tried to remember the password entering all his commonly used passwords but they did not work. What the Ironkey does, when the maximum number of tries has been reached it self encrypts and locks the contents forever. That's how it happened with Stefan. Even though the  article was published in 2021, the event took place in 2012. In 2012 his 7002 Bitcoins would have been worth about $94 527. Thomas reports feeling an inexplicable paranoia and other feelings he can't put words on. Who would blame him? I mean this is 7002 Bitcoins, even though it was worth less than $100k back then still it was/is a lot of money. Some of us would have gotten incontinence and permanent depression 😔.

Now 11 years later, his coins are worth over $15 billion dollars. But he doesn’t care anymore because he has made peace with what happened and now tries to live positively. All I  could say as I read the article was, he must really be so strong but then sometimes life defeats you so much you have no option but to be strong. Even I too, would have made peace with it but I know for sure every night in the wee hours I would be awake obsessing over what could have been, right after I would sigh and fall asleep back to reality 😔

Oh well, at least now we know not to write our passwords on pieces of paper. You never know which coin can be a source of generational wealth for you. Has this ever happened to you in crypto or anywhere else in life, like you kind of self sabotaged through one action or another be sure to leave your comments below. Lets share our experiences, heal and educate others. Remember a problem shared is half solved so bring the stories,  lets offload our burdens. 💪

Quick fact: According to Chainanalysis, of all the Bitcoins ever created/mined up to date, 20% of it seems to be locked or stranded in wallets that the owners no longer have access to. Imagine how much money you can make if you could start a business recovering lost wallet passwords and charge 10% of the amount in the wallet 🤯. There's already a few companies that do password recovery but if you have the passion to, the know-how and the money to start why not explore this route, the pie is big enough.

## you can read the article here https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/01/12/technology/bitcoin-passwords-wallets-fortunes.amp.html