The Blockchain Bandit: Finding Over 700 Active Private Keys

ISE, a security consulting firm headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland, claims that they discovered 732 private keys as well as their corresponding public keys that committed 49,060 transactions to the Ethereum blockchain. "Additionally, we identified 13,319 Ethereum that was transferred to either invalid destination addresses, or wallets derived from weak keys that at the height of the Ethereum market had a combined total value of USD 18,899,969. In the process, we discovered that funds from these weak-key addresses are being pilfered and sent to a destination address belonging to an individual or group that is running active campaigns to compromise/gather private keys and obtain these funds. On January 13, 2018, this “blockchain bandit” held a balance of 37,926 ETH valued at USD 54,343,407," the company said.

ISE explained its findings in more detail in a report titled "Ethercombing: Finding Secrets in Popular Places," which was published on April 23.