One bitcoin was only 19p in 2010 – today it’s a whopping £76,000
Do you think you might have bought a few bitcoins on a whim years ago and forgotten all about it? You could be sitting on a fortune, with one bitcoin worth only around 19p in 2010 today worth a whopping £76,000.
But, as bitcoin is a cryptocurrency – a form of virtual money that doesn’t exist physically – it’s not controlled by any central bank or other organisation. That means only the person with the access key to a digital wallet has access to your bitcoins. And if you lose access to that wallet, there’s no helpline you can call to get it back again.
That’s what happened to James Howells, from Newport, who lost a hard drive with 8,000 bitcoins on it when his then-girlfriend threw it away in 2013. Today that is worth £620million – money Mr Howells has no way of laying his hands on.
As bitcoin is digital, the currency isn’t lost or destroyed if a hard drive is – it still exists out in cyberspace. Mr Howells has tried repeatedly to get access to the tip in his home city where he’s convinced the hard drive containing his bitcoin wallet is located.
He’s even offered to buy the site off the council, but has been repeatedly rebuffed. If you think you bought some bitcoin years ago and forgot about it, there are a few steps you can take.
How to find out if you have any bitcoin
Using a Windows computer
- Press Win and F;
- In the search window, type ‘wallet.dat (without quotation marks);
- This will search your computer for any Bitcoin wallets. It may take some time depending upon the size of your hard drive or hard drive;
- Alternatively, open the file explorer and search for C:UsersUsernameApplication DataRoamingBitcoin if you’re on Windows 7 or Vista;
- If you’re still running Windows XP, the path is C:Documents and SettingsUsernameApplication DataRoamingBitcoin
Using a Mac
- If you are using macOS, go to Finder and look for the following directory: ~/Library/Application Support/Bitcoin/wallet.dat;
- To see hidden folders like ~/Library, press shift, the command key, and G, then paste ~/Library/Application Support/Bitcoin.
You will still need the password or PIN – sometimes called a seed phrase – to access the wallet, and if you don’t know what this is you’re out of luck. If you know some of this information there are many services online which claim to be able to help you recover lost bitcoin, and some of these are legitimate, but users should be extremely careful to do their due diligence before handing over sensitive financial information.
If you know the details of our wallet but not how much is in it, go to blockchain.com, enter all the information, and bob’s your uncle. And if you used a specific type of wallet – there’s lots available – go to its website for the information you need.