There are many hazards in the wastelands of Fallout 4, but one Bitcoin-loving gamer found out the hard way that real life can be dangerous too. On the Bitcoin subreddit, user arkanoah was asking for help determining how his Bitcoins were stolen. It turns out a pirated game is probably the culprit.
Bitcoin is a digital currency that is held in wallet files. All Bitcoin transactions are processed in the blockchain, a sort of public master ledger of Bitcoin usage. Arkanoah posted a link to the mysterious transaction on the blockchain, showing a 4.88 BTC withdrawal from his wallet on November 11th. Guess what else happened around then. Yep, Fallout 4 was released.
Someone asked if perhaps the OP had pirated Fallout 4, and he confirmed that he had. While downloading pirated software is never entirely safe, Fallout 4 releases in particular appear to be crawling with novel malware. The most likely scenario is that an attacker gained access to arkanoah’s machine and copied his Bitcoin wallet file. The password was cracked, and the thief was able to transfer all the coins away.
Because the blockchain is public, you can see where the coins were transferred. After they hit another wallet, they were split up, mixed with more coins, and are now impossible to trace. See, in addition to being public, the blockchain is anonymous. There’s no insurance here — if you manage your own wallet, you’re responsible if it’s compromised. Based on the current value, those 4.88 coins were worth about $1,773. Ouch. Buying Fallout 4 would have been a hell of a lot cheaper. That’s an expensive lesson learned.
2020 update: OUCH OUCH OUCH.
