- On Tuesday, Parity revealed that, while fixing a bug that let hackers steal $32m out of few multi-signature wallets, it had inadvertently introduced a new flaw into its systems that allowed one user to become the sole owner of every single multi-signature wallet.
The user, “devops199”, triggered the flaw apparently by accident. When they realised what they had done, they attempted to undo the damage by deleting the code which had transferred ownership of the funds. Rather than returning the money, however, that simply locked all the funds in those multisignature wallets permanently, with no way to access them.
Well, if we're arguing definitions, technically it could be said that the user who triggered the bug 'accidentally stole' the wallets at one point. Even if no-one has them after everything transpired. And something lost doesn't necessarily mean you don't know where it is. If I kick a ball in to a lake by accident I could say: "I lost the ball in the lake." Though I can clearly see it it in the lake, in this case 'lost' means no longer possessed. I get your point though, it could have a clearer title. Interestingly, they've now removed "stolen" from the title on the original page.
So, I don't own any crypto but have been thinking about diversifying into it. Are there mechanisms to not rely on a shady website to store it for me? I realize that may be a dumb question, but I don't know the answer so I don't know how dumb.
If you don't want to store a ton, use Coinbase. If you want to store a bunch of ETH, use insomniasexx's https://myetherwallet.com to create paper wallets. I'm not sure the best way to generate BTC paper wallets anymore. But do some research. Get a general understanding of how transactions work before diving in.
Know how Sony is this massive corporation who you would assume would keep your information safe, but actually stored your bank account numbers in plaintext? The cool thing about crypto is you need a set of numbers to get to it. You could write that shit on a napkin (don't lose the napkin, and don't post photos of it to the internet). The dumb thing about crypto is people go "kthxbye" and put their shit into an exchange because, well, that's what you do with money, you put it in a bank. Except it isn't a bank it's Magic The Gathering Online Exchange and you should fucking feel bad trusting them with your money, ass.