Former Mt.Gox CEO Mark Karpeles has proposed a hard fork that would unlock approximately 79,956 BTC stolen from the exchange in 2011.

Can we get some bitcoins back to MtGox creditors?https://t.co/Z7rymy1vuS

— Mark Karpelès (@MagicalTux) February 27, 2026

The coins, currently valued at around $5 billion, have remained in the hacker's address for 15 years, during which no attempts have been made to move or return them, Karpeles noted.

In 2014, Mt.Gox filed for bankruptcy, which later transitioned into civil rehabilitation. The process administrator, Nobuaki Kobayashi, oversees the return of funds to creditors but lacks access to the 79,956 BTC, as the private key to the address is known only to the hacker. Karpeles believes these funds could be included in the overall bankruptcy estate.

His initiative involves "adding a consensus rule" that would allow the coins to be unlocked using a signature from the asset recovery address.

"This proposal is not an attempt to circumvent the usual Bitcoin development process. It is an effort to start a discussion on whether the community considers this specific, exceptional case worthy of attention," Karpeles emphasized.

The project entails implementing a script that targets a specific address and activates at a designated block if approved by a majority.

"This is a hard fork: it makes a previously invalid transaction valid. All nodes in the network will need to update to reach the maximum activation level," the programmer clarified.

Arguments For and Against

In support of his proposal, Karpeles pointed to fairness considerations for creditors and minimal technical risk. He noted that precedents for such interventions in protocol rules already exist.

Moreover, returning clearly abandoned coins would benefit the overall Bitcoin economy, as would clearing the vast number of "dust" UTXOs accumulated at the address.

Karpeles acknowledged the primary concern of violating the principle of blockchain immutability:

"The core value of Bitcoin lies in the guarantee that consensus rules will not be changed to redirect specific UTXOs. Even a justified exception could undermine trust in this guarantee. If this can be done once, it can be done again."

The consequences could include demands for similar solutions to recover funds in other thefts, as well as lowered security standards if problems can be resolved in this manner, the programmer added.

As a reminder, in October 2025, the Mt.Gox administrator postponed the deadline for creditor payments to October 31, 2026.