The Quadriga Lock Out: Cruel victims of cold wallets or the latest high profile Bitcoin fraud?
Canadian cryptocurrency exchange QuadrigaCX may well owe its customers $250 million but following the death of their CEO apparently no one knows the password required to access it. This may sound incredible — especially given the amount of money involved — but according to reports the story is as true as it is unbelievable.
The fact Quadriga’s accounts hold more than $180 million in virtual currencies isn’t in question. However, following their CEO Gerald Cotton’s sudden death in December 2018 from Crohn’s Disease the company has claimed no one has the passwords required to access customer funds.
As a result on the 31st January QuadrigaCX told the public they had lost access to its cryptocurrency reserves and would be taking the exchange offline before promptly filing for creditor protection with a Canadian higher court in Nova Scotia.
Under Canadian law that creditors protection would help Quadriga avoid immediate legal action from its debtors, an estimated 115,000 users who — according to initial estimates — are owed approximately $250 million in total. A large number of those users have not been deterred by the protection afforded by the court and have taken to social media to question whether Gerald Cotton is really dead and demand evidence to prove he is.
