The United Kingdom branch of Coinbase has come to a settlement with a cryptocurrency theft victim after fighting a legal battle for two months.
The news was reported by legal news website Law360 on 10th September. It was reported that the aforementioned exchange had settled a deal with Liam Robertson, the CEO of Alphabit to discontinue the dispute, although the deal amount remains undisclosed.
The CEO lost about 80 BTC worth of which is about $1 million over a phishing attack. The email account of the company on which he was preparing to invest over 100 Bitcoins got hacked. Out of this, about 80 stolen Bitcoins were diverted to the wallet held by Coinbase, rest 15 Bitcoins were sent to peer exchange LocalBitcoins, and 5 BTCs were sent to an offline wallet.
Soon after this, Roberson received an instruction from Bankers Trust to find the individuality of the wallet holder and to see whether it is the same individual who made the transaction. Soon after this, Robertson requested an asset preservation order which was granted to him in August. This order prevented Coinbase from transferring the stolen Bitcoin. As per Law360, this order can help the court of England and Wales to handle Bitcoin as a property.
A task force led by the UK government introduced a public discussion in May to regulate the position of crypto assets. As per the task force, the undefined state of the cryptocurrencies is the major hindrance for potential investors. Although the final decision of the task force is still incomplete, and the court is waiting for them.
The lawyer of Robertson has said that this case would help the victim of stolen cryptocurrency to reclaim it by specifying whether it is an asset or a sum of money. The evidence has surfaced in the time when almost 13% of the cryptocurrency theft cases happens over phishing attacks. From the beginning of the present year, there is a steep rise in cryptocurrency theft cases. Nearly $356 million worth of digital currencies have already been stolen, and out of this, $47 million are swiped through a phishing attack.