(CNN) – A Briton who threw a hard drive loaded with bitcoins in the trash introduced the local authority where he lives for more than $70 million if he allowed him to search for a landfill.
Computer scientist James Howells got rid of the unit, which contained a virtual store of 7,500 bitcoins, between June and August 2013. First, it had exploited the virtual currency 4 years earlier when it was of little value.
But when the price of the cryptocurrency grew and went after it, he discovered that he had mistakenly thrown the hard drive away.
Now that his lost bitcoin has risen further, Howells has reached out to Newport City Council in Wales to request permission to dig an express segment of the landfill where he thinks the hard drive ended up.
In return, he presented himself to pay the city council a quarter of the existing treasury price, which he said could be distributed to local residents.
Virtual currency created in 2009 through an un named PC programmer or a programmer organization known as Satoshi Nakamoto. Bitcoins are necessarily PC files that are stored in a “virtual wallet” on your device. They can then be used as payment, with each transaction recorded in a public list called blockchain.
The value of bitcoin has reached a record in recent days and now trades around $37,000.
Howells first discovered that the hard drive was missing when its bitcoin was worth around $9 million, at existing rates, estimated to be worth around $273 million.
He told CNN, “I’ve introduced myself to donate 25% or 52. 5 million pounds ($71. 7 million) to the city of Newport to distribute to all local citizens living in Newport if I locate and bitcoins. “
“This would equa’t be about 175 euros ($239) consistent with the user for the whole city (316,000 inhabitants). Unfortunately, they turned down the be offer and didn’t even have a face-to-face discussion with me about it. “
After finding the error, Howells went to the sale to see where the hard drive had ended up. He told CNN at the time: “As soon as I saw the site, I think I didn’t stand a chance. The domain covered is huge.
However, he now thinks he knows how to get it back.
“The plan would be to excavate an express domain of landfill based on a network and hard drive reference formula respecting all standards of protection and the environment,” he told CNN Friday. “The reader would then approach the knowledge and specialists who may simply rebuild the unit from scratch with new currencies and check the little knowledge I want to access bitcoins. “
“The price of the hard drive is more than two hundred million pounds (about $273 million) and I’m happy to share a percentage with the other people in Newport if I have a chance to look for it. Approximately 50% would pass to investors who invest the capital to finance the project, and I would end up with the remaining 25%,” he added.
A Newport City Council spokeswoman told CNN that local government authority had been “contacted several times since 2013 about the recovery of PC devices believed to involve bitcoins. “
In a message sent to CNN, the spokeswoman said the council had not rejected be’s offer, but that it was not legal to search for the site.
She said: “The council has continually told Mr. Howells that the excavation is not imaginable under our licensing permit and that the excavation itself would have a massive environmental effect on the surrounding area.
“The charge of digging the landfill, garage and waste remedy can be only millions of pounds, with no guarantee of locating it or continuing to function.