Mark Karpelès proposes hard fork to recover roughly 80,000 BTC from 2011 Mt. Gox hack

Mark Karpelès, the former CEO of the defunct exchange Mt. Gox, published a draft proposal calling for a Bitcoin hard fork intended to enable recovery of almost 80,000 BTC that investigators link to the exchange's 2011 hack; those coins are valued at more than $5.2 billion at current prices, according to reporting ^[2][1].

The proposal has reignited one of Bitcoin's core ideological debates — whether the protocol's immutability should be overridden to rectify historic thefts — and prompted public discussion on forums and social media about the legal and technical implications of a chain split ^[2][3].

Karpelès framed the measure as addressing what he called the "last sore point" of Mt. Gox's long bankruptcy process, noting the case began 12 years ago and that this proposal is presented as a draft for consideration by the community ^[4].

The plan remains a draft and would require a coordinated hard fork and broad community support to be implemented; reporting shows it has already prompted debate but no concrete pathway to execution has been reported ^[2][4].