TechFlame News: Mark Karpelès, the former CEO of the defunct exchange Mt. Gox, recently proposed a Bitcoin hard fork plan. The proposal suggests modifying the consensus rules to recover approximately 79,956 BTC stolen in a 2011 hack, valued at around $5.2 billion at current prices.

The proposal targets a wallet address linked to the 2011 Mt. Gox system breach. This address received nearly 80,000 bitcoins after the hack and has remained untouched for over 15 years. Under current Bitcoin rules, these funds can only be transferred if the corresponding private key is held.

According to the proposal, the new rules would allow control over the unspent outputs in that address through signatures from a Mt. Gox recovery address, thereby incorporating the funds into the existing judicial oversight repayment process to compensate Mt. Gox creditors.

Karpelès stated that this plan is merely a starting point for discussion. The proposed rule change would be limited to a single address and activated at a specific future block height. However, the proposal also acknowledges that this plan requires a coordinated network-wide upgrade. If some community members refuse to support it, there is a risk of blockchain splitting.

It is important to note that these approximately 80,000 BTC are currently not part of the assets allocated to Mt. Gox creditors and are not under the control of the bankruptcy trustee.