Goodbye, world!

[icopress]

I had hoped to make some sort of a meaningful speech here.  Right now, rather, I will just remind everyone of the Lauda memorial crypto-puzzle to claim 0.002 BTC.

I'm a little confused.. the last time I sent funds to this address the mystery was still not solved. But I see that in March last year the funds were moved. Could it be that someone solved the mystery and did not report it? (since I doubt it was nullius).

[citb0in]

I had hoped to make some sort of a meaningful speech here.  Right now, rather, I will just remind everyone of the Lauda memorial crypto-puzzle to claim 0.002 BTC.

I'm a little confused.. the last time I sent funds to this address the mystery was still not solved. But I see that in March last year the funds were moved. Could it be that someone solved the mystery and did not report it? (since I doubt it was nullius).

possibly? 

[ibminer]

I had hoped to make some sort of a meaningful speech here.  Right now, rather, I will just remind everyone of the Lauda memorial crypto-puzzle to claim 0.002 BTC.

I'm a little confused.. the last time I sent funds to this address the mystery was still not solved. But I see that in March last year the funds were moved. Could it be that someone solved the mystery and did not report it? (since I doubt it was nullius).

Seems like funds were received, balance is up to .01BTC

[nutildah]

Seems like funds were received, balance is up to .01BTC

Just spent a solid couple hours trying to decode the OP_RETURN and figure out how it might relate to piecing together a private key... Came up with bumpkis. However, I did notice that a transaction previous to the one that funded the address also has a OP_RETURN in it:

https://learnmeabitcoin.com/explorer/tx/40fca7f95058864b1457fb8f626fd02a97aba7f502386ad30f7ca184f5ee81c4

So that's potentially a clue for someone looking to solve the puzzle. Good luck, I'm out.

[mcdouglasx]

Seems like funds were received, balance is up to .01BTC

Just spent a solid couple hours trying to decode the OP_RETURN and figure out how it might relate to piecing together a private key... Came up with bumpkis. However, I did notice that a transaction previous to the one that funded the address also has a OP_RETURN in it:

https://learnmeabitcoin.com/explorer/tx/40fca7f95058864b1457fb8f626fd02a97aba7f502386ad30f7ca184f5ee81c4

So that's potentially a clue for someone looking to solve the puzzle. Good luck, I'm out.

I don't know if you've noticed in the original https://mempool.space/tx/000000000fdf0c619cd8e0d512c7e2c0da5a5808e60f12f1e0d01522d2986a51.

The input with the address bc1qjvm9jkrjw9uvsn8905dwa6eau0guyc9laau03a seems to be a vanity address:

 "0guyc9laau03a" :

- "0 guy c 9 lauda"

- "zero guy change 9 lauda"

Or is it just a coincidence and I've become paranoid.

[nutildah]

I don't know if you've noticed in the original https://mempool.space/tx/000000000fdf0c619cd8e0d512c7e2c0da5a5808e60f12f1e0d01522d2986a51.

The input with the address bc1qjvm9jkrjw9uvsn8905dwa6eau0guyc9laau03a seems to be a vanity address:

 "0guyc9laau03a" :

- "0 guy c 9 lauda"

- "zero guy change 9 lauda"

Or is it just a coincidence and I've become paranoid.

I think you're right about that as nullius referenced doing a lot of computing for the puzzle, probably for generating such vanity addresses. Except maybe "c" stands for "cat" and "9" as in nine lives. Since he mentioned private key a few times, I also think the "nullian brainwallet" is the characters for a bech32 private key rather than a traditional brainwallet.

[PrimeNumber7]

Seems like funds were received, balance is up to .01BTC

Just spent a solid couple hours trying to decode the OP_RETURN and figure out how it might relate to piecing together a private key... Came up with bumpkis. However, I did notice that a transaction previous to the one that funded the address also has a OP_RETURN in it:

https://learnmeabitcoin.com/explorer/tx/40fca7f95058864b1457fb8f626fd02a97aba7f502386ad30f7ca184f5ee81c4

So that's potentially a clue for someone looking to solve the puzzle. Good luck, I'm out.

I don't know if you've noticed in the original https://mempool.space/tx/000000000fdf0c619cd8e0d512c7e2c0da5a5808e60f12f1e0d01522d2986a51.

The input with the address bc1qjvm9jkrjw9uvsn8905dwa6eau0guyc9laau03a seems to be a vanity address:

 "0guyc9laau03a" :

- "0 guy c 9 lauda"

- "zero guy change 9 lauda"

Or is it just a coincidence and I've become paranoid.

anyone can make a vanity address.

[mcdouglasx]

anyone can make a vanity address.

yes, "but given that

All of the information required to reconstruct the private key is published on the blockchain.

It is logical to think that it could be a steganography puzzle, so all the small details should be considered.

Anyway, this could be some text in the hashed puzzle, I assume in a loop of nine hashes (because of the nine zeros in the transaction ID and the nine lives of the cat that Lauda and nullius mentioned).

It has been a wild forum life, - or perhaps, nine forum lives involving everything from the dark arts of moderation, to being burnt at the stake several times. (I got better.) Thanks to my forum friends, fans, and cult votaries.

Thank you everyone in advance, quite the 9 lives that some Kitty had here.

Kitty forever! 😺😺😺😺😺😺😺😺😺

If anyone wants to try with whatever comes to mind, I leave you a script that follows my logic.

Code:

import hashlib
import ecdsa
from ecdsa import SECP256k1, SigningKey


#################################################################################


target = '😼 Sacrifice to Lauda! (topic=5282911)'.encode()


#################################################################################


def sha256(data):
    return hashlib.sha256(data).digest()

def ripemd160(data):
    h = hashlib.new('ripemd160')
    h.update(data)
    return h.digest()

BECH32_CHARS = 'qpzry9x8gf2tvdw0s3jn54khce6mua7l'

def bech32_polymod(values):
    generator = [0x3b6a57b2, 0x26508e6d, 0x1ea119fa, 0x3d4233dd, 0x2a1462b3]
    chk = 1
    for v in values:
        b = (chk >> 25)
        chk = (chk & 0x1ffffff) << 5 ^ v
        for i in range(5):
            chk ^= generator[i] if ((b >> i) & 1) else 0
    return chk

def bech32_hrp_expand(hrp):
    return [ord(x) >> 5 for x in hrp] + [0] + [ord(x) & 31 for x in hrp]

def bech32_create_checksum(hrp, data):
    values = bech32_hrp_expand(hrp) + data
    polymod = bech32_polymod(values + [0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0]) ^ 1
    return [(polymod >> 5 * (5 - i)) & 31 for i in range(6)]

def bech32_encode(hrp, data):
    combined = data + bech32_create_checksum(hrp, data)
    return hrp + '1' + ''.join([BECH32_CHARS[d] for d in combined])

def convertbits(data, frombits, tobits, pad=True):
    acc = 0
    bits = 0
    ret = []
    maxv = (1 << tobits) - 1
    for value in data:
        if value < 0 or (value >> frombits):
            raise ValueError("Invalid value")
        acc = (acc << frombits) | value
        bits += frombits
        while bits >= tobits:
            bits -= tobits
            ret.append((acc >> bits) & maxv)
    if pad:
        if bits:
            ret.append((acc << (tobits - bits)) & maxv)
    elif bits >= frombits or ((acc << (tobits - bits)) & maxv):
        raise ValueError("Invalid bits")
    return ret

def create_bech32_address(pubkey):
    sha256_result = sha256(pubkey)
    ripemd160_result = ripemd160(sha256_result)
    data = convertbits(ripemd160_result, 8, 5)
    data = [0] + data
    hrp = 'bc'
    return bech32_encode(hrp, data)

def run_test(algo, name, test_num, use_hex):
    data = target
    for _ in range(9):
        hash_obj = hashlib.new(algo, data)
        data = hash_obj.digest()
        if use_hex:
            pk_hex = data.hex()
            data = pk_hex.encode()
    private_key = data.hex() if not use_hex else pk_hex

    if len(private_key) < 64:
        private_key = private_key.zfill(64)
    elif len(private_key) > 64:
        private_key = private_key[:64]

    sk = SigningKey.from_string(bytes.fromhex(private_key), curve=SECP256k1)
    vk = sk.verifying_key
    public_key = vk.to_string("compressed").hex()

    address = create_bech32_address(bytes.fromhex(public_key))
    print(f"\n--- {name} Test {test_num} ---")
    print("Private Key:", private_key)
    print("Public Key: ", public_key)
    print("Bech32 Address: ", address)


algos = [
    ('sha256', 'SHA-256'),
    ('sha1', 'SHA-1'),
    ('md5', 'MD5')
]

for algo, name in algos:
    run_test(algo, name, 1, use_hex=True) 
    run_test(algo, name, 2, use_hex=False)

[PrimeNumber7]

anyone can make a vanity address.

yes, "but given that

All of the information required to reconstruct the private key is published on the blockchain.

It is logical to think that it could be a steganography puzzle, so all the small details should be considered.

[...]

Over time, Lauda cared increasingly about her privacy. She explicitly said in the OP that her 'Lauda' identity was ending, and she explicitly revoked her GPG keys (identity), and provided no replacement. Also, the "vibe" I remember getting when originally reading the OP was that either lauda might be in some kind of danger, and/or her personal information may have leaked to someone such that she was forced to leave. As such, I don't think Lauda left any "clues" as to her "new" forum identity, and I would even go as far as to say that her new forum identity, if one exists, was probably not created until some time after the OP was created.

If you believe that Lauda did something wrong (no one is above reproach, and I think that is a generally fair argument against anyone), and her new alts should be tagged, that is another topic of discussion, however, I would say that existing issues were more or less resolved when the OP was created, and I am not aware of any *new* issues that have come up since the OP was created, which was ~4.5 years ago.

[nutildah]

^^^
Weird that you would bump this thread just to say that, which doesn't have anything to do with the post you quoted. From what I gathered, you (Quickseller) specifically had something to do with Lauda' disappearance. I could be wrong, but that's the "vibe" that I got.

If Lauda did come back to the forum, they had quite a change of attitude because I don't see anyone that matches their level of vindictiveness, except for you, maybe.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I think you're right about that as nullius referenced doing a lot of computing for the puzzle, probably for generating such vanity addresses. Except maybe "c" stands for "cat" and "9" as in nine lives.

Huh.  If you'd given me a full week I probably wouldn't have come up with that, but knowing Lauda and his/her [going to refer to Lauda as she/her from now on] frequently mentioning cats, it makes a lot of sense. 

If Lauda did come back to the forum, they had quite a change of attitude because I don't see anyone that matches their level of vindictiveness, except for you, maybe.

I've long been wondering if Lauda had an alt account they could be posting with, but given how strong a presence she had and how vocal she was with her opinions, I doubt she'd be able to just slink into the corners and be quiet--unless there was a compelling reason for her to do so, which there might well have been since she did apparently abandon the forum.  Round and round go the thoughts.

[ibminer]

Maybe not relevant (or is it!?) that the incoming transaction icopress mentioned, which happened on the 3 year anniversary date last year (March 14th 2024), ended up with only 8 "nibbles" (0's) in the hash/txid, instead of 9 like the original. Obviously intentionally done, but who knows who sent it. *shrug*

March 14, 2021 000000000fdf0c619cd8e0d512c7e2c0da5a5808e60f12f1e0d01522d2986a51 (from bc1qjvm9jkrjw9uvsn8905dwa6eau0guyc9laau03a)
March 14, 2024 00000000c0747ece95852c2b7d37b09770873ed8b50fb7be2ba3d400defab06c (from bc1qkycaf62t9gnuxdlzqgy0q4vpenym9fc7dhvuez)

Seemed like Lauda left because of some sort of perceived danger, threat, or unexpected circumstance. I think it is probably likely that Lauda came back some time after leaving, or never really left at all, but I doubt they would act the same way, to avoid being recognized.

[icopress]

[...] Obviously intentionally done, but who knows who sent it. *shrug*

The first transaction was made by nullius, the second and third by me, the fourth I can't identify but the fifth (the one you mentioned) was definitely made by vjudeu.

I'm a little confused.. the last time I sent funds to this address the mystery was still not solved. But I see that in March last year the funds were moved. Could it be that someone solved the mystery and did not report it? (since I doubt it was nullius).

Note: I was wrong.

I mistakenly interpreted the current balance of 0.01 BTC as 0.001 BTC (knowing that the address should have had at least 0.003333 when I last checked it).

https://mempool.space/ru/address/bc1qt2mdkehmphggajer3ur3g8l754scj4fdrmw3rn

[mcdouglasx]

The first transaction was made by nullius, the second and third by me, the fourth I can't identify but the fifth (the one you mentioned) was definitely made by vjudeu.

Yes, this puzzle has several suspicious points, one of them being 'pi'.

March 14 can refer to 3.14, which is pi.

Nullius mentions 'bignumber,' 'Raspberry Pi,' and highlights the date 3-14 in many comments.

This transaction has a lot of references to pi, https://mempool.space/tx/d3ec0298c979271f0e6c2d7e4c2718648cc9e958adfdf7d3322d3d2b62a9f36b.

From the block time 314159, to a link to a YouTube video that explores how pi could be an integer using powers.

Code:

{"version":2,"locktime":314159,"ins":[{"n":14,"script":{"asm":"","hex":""},"sequence":3141592653,"txid":"dd68f24bc0b05f42f98b9f45d672b20caf488448a790f52be5e74204fb0af7e1","witness":["3044022053bd7113fcd359481539951957b52c2aa312286f40ccdc3ea9ab2569461e5827022041b5e4e2e11bd149c0b2eddc894150dcbdf78b759d59a9df23b0458d69225ca201","03b895a09f1c791d938a1975e2a43fef07d99d7cdcb35c664099eba2abe77325aa"]}],"outs":[{"n":0,"script":{"addresses":[],"asm":"OP_RETURN OP_3 OP_14 57687920cf805ecf805ecf805ecf8020636f756c6420626520616e20696e7465676572 68747470733a2f2f7777772e796f75747562652e636f6d2f77617463683f763d426448464c66762d546851","hex":"6a535e2357687920cf805ecf805ecf805ecf8020636f756c6420626520616e20696e74656765722b68747470733a2f2f7777772e796f75747562652e636f6d2f77617463683f763d426448464c66762d546851"},"value":3},{"n":1,"script":{"addresses":["bc1qt2mdkehmphggajer3ur3g8l754scj4fdrmw3rn"],"asm":"OP_0 5ab6db66fb0dd08ecb238f07141ffea56189552d","hex":"00145ab6db66fb0dd08ecb238f07141ffea56189552d"},"value":31415},{"n":2,"script":{"addresses":["16GbKct9UffrwevPhEZmfuMybgz9k34Cat"],"asm":"OP_DUP OP_HASH160 39cb84a1187b94b9d3e48ddc84748c035f39dc8e OP_EQUALVERIFY OP_CHECKSIG","hex":"76a91439cb84a1187b94b9d3e48ddc84748c035f39dc8e88ac"},"value":8518}],"hash":"d3ec0298c979271f0e6c2d7e4c2718648cc9e958adfdf7d3322d3d2b62a9f36b","txid":"d3ec0298c979271f0e6c2d7e4c2718648cc9e958adfdf7d3322d3d2b62a9f36b"}

16GbKct9UffrwevPhEZmfuMybgz9k34Cat

[OgNasty]

Yes, this puzzle has several suspicious points

I think even he (Lauda) would be impressed with how well this troll seems to be continuing to work on the community well after everyone should have realized what the intent actually was. A shame he won’t be coming back anytime soon to appreciate his work and thank those who continue to make it entertaining to watch.

[nutildah]

I see no reason to doubt the puzzle is real, and that nullius and Lauda are/were two separate people. Toward the end of their time here, Lauda insisted on making everything right with Quickseller; TMAN also did the same. That always struck me as a little bit odd but ultimately it doesn't really matter as it had no real effect on uninvolved parties. I do miss TMAN's sense of humor though.

[mcdouglasx]

Another curiosity of the puzzle is that the Locktime refers to a block mined on the day Lauda said goodbye here: block 653384.

[OgNasty]

I see no reason to doubt the puzzle is real, and that nullius and Lauda are/were two separate people. Toward the end of their time here, Lauda insisted on making everything right with Quickseller; TMAN also did the same. That always struck me as a little bit odd but ultimately it doesn't really matter as it had no real effect on uninvolved parties. I do miss TMAN's sense of humor though.

You did know Lauda right?  I have so many things I could spill about Lauda's manipulation of this forum for his own profit, using alt accounts to harass people, selling accounts, escrow scams, using alt accounts to spam the forum and then using his status as a moderator to moderate the posts and make money from it, etc...  I could literally write a book.  It amazes me that people like him just because he'd use his alt accounts to attack people relentlessly and try to get the rest of the community on his side.  If you think Lauda is a good guy (or a girl as the really dense seemed to think) then you should probably consider that maybe you're a really bad judge of character and easily manipulated.  You should also look at some of the other well known accounts that disappeared around the same time...  Once you see it, you can't view this forum the same way again.

[Vod]

You did know Lauda right?  I have so many things I could spill about Lauda's manipulation of this forum for his own profit, using alt accounts to harass people, selling accounts, escrow scams, using alt accounts to spam the forum and then using his status as a moderator to moderate the posts and make money from it, etc...  I could literally write a book. 

But you didn't right?  You didn't tell anybody because none of it is true, or because you are afraid it will cost you everything you own?

I put my accusations in writing because they are true.   You cannot.