Ripple's former CTO forgot the password to his hardware wallet, which contained 7,002 bitcoins

Although Ripple is under tremendous regulatory pressure in the United States, Stephen Thomas, the former chief technology officer of Ripple, may have a more troubling problem: figuring out what the password to his Bitcoin wealth is.

According to a wild story published by The New York Times on Jan. 12, Steven Thomas is now unable to access his IronKey hardware wallet, which contains 7,002 Bitcoins, which are worth $231 million at press time.

He has two more attempts.

One of Bitcoin’s biggest selling points is that it lets you be your own bank, meaning you don’t have to trust a centralized authority to store your funds. But that privilege comes with a high level of responsibility, which Thomas now estimates isn’t worth it.

The whole idea of ​​being your own bank — let me put it this way: ‘Do you make your own shoes?’ The reason we have a bank is we don’t want to deal with all the things that banks do.

The 7,002 bitcoins were given to Stephen Thomas in 2011 for making educational videos about Bitcoin. Thomas has now lost his seed phrase, which is necessary to unlock his cryptocurrency wealth.

After eight unsuccessful attempts to access his wallet, Thomas now has two attempts left until his wallet is permanently encrypted:

I just lay in bed and think about the password. Then I go to the computer and try some new strategy, but it doesn't work and I get desperate again... I'm at the point where I say to myself, "Let it go, let it be your past, and keep a healthy mindset.

$125 billion worth of Bitcoin has been lost

Thomas's plight is reminiscent of the QuadrigaCX drama, which collapsed in early 2019. The Canadian exchange's CEO, Gerald Cherten, died mysteriously in India from Crohn's disease while holding the keys to $250 million worth of customer assets. Then, unhappy and suspicious users began demanding that his body be exhumed to prove whether he was really dead.

Overall, as many as 3.7 million bitcoins are believed to be permanently lost, according to a report released by blockchain monitoring firm Chainalysis. At current prices, their market value is worth $125 billion.