US Man Sues Two Companies Seeking Ownership of Over 39,000 Dormant Bitcoin Addresses

May 26th News, according to Cryptopolitan, a plaintiff using the pseudonym "Noah Doe" has filed a lawsuit in a New York court seeking ownership of 39,069 dormant Bitcoin wallets, including Satoshi Nakamoto's address. These wallets are estimated to hold approximately 3.7 million Bitcoin, valued at around $290 billion. The plaintiff, through two Wyoming shell companies, ABC Company and XYZ Company, submitted a 901-page lawsuit on May 1st, claiming these Bitcoins qualify as "abandoned property" under New York's abandoned property law. Sani, founder of the on-chain analysis platform Timechain Index, pointed out a core issue with the lawsuit: most Bitcoin from the Satoshi era are stored in pay-to-public-key format, while the plaintiff sent legal notices to the corresponding pay-to-public-key-hash addresses, most of which have no balance. Even if the plaintiff obtains a favorable judgment, the Bitcoin network cannot transfer funds without private keys, rendering the ruling unenforceable. David Schwartz, CTO of Ripple, stated that the ruling would have no practical impact on the Bitcoin network.