In a post published on LinkedIn Jessica Jorgensen, casting director of a new TV series by Itv, addressed crypto users who have forgotten their wallet passwords, their seed phrases, or have lost private keys. The series would aim to offer advice from cryptographic and cyber security experts to help users regain access to their funds, or show viewers some of the options available to them. Jorgensen specifically asks users to mention how many passwords they have left before their accounts are blocked, and whether they are willing to use the remaining attempts with the help of experts.
A study published in April 2020 by digital research firm Cane Island suggested that there will never be more than 14 million Bitcoins in circulation due to incidents in which users have lost keys, or accidentally threw hardware containing a wallet, sent crypto at the wrong address, or have not taken steps to pass on their funds in the event of their death. Some examples of this is the QuadrigaCX cryptocurrency exchange which lost $ 145 million after the death of its founder, the only person to hold the funds’ private keys; or the case of Stefan Thomas, a San Francisco programmer who lost the password to access his hard drive containing 7,002 BTC. Even in the early years of Bitcoin’s birth, when the coin was worth a few cents and was sometimes distributed for free as a prize for online games or contests, many people not thinking about the value it could achieve didn’t care about the credentials to use them.
