According to chain analysis company Arkham, the security upgrade of the wallet may be the reason for the dormant $8 billion Bitcoin (BTC) in the long-dormant Satoshi-era wallet last week.
Data on the chain shows that since 2011, each wallet has 8 wallets, each with 10,000 BTC, transferring its funds to a modern BC1Q-style address, a relatively old version of 1-Champion address that is a safer and more efficient format.
The new address is local Segwit format, which provides lower fees, improved transaction efficiency, and strong protection against certain types of vulnerabilities.
Arkham, who marked the transfer, said there was no evidence that the whales were selling any bitcoin. The funds remain unaffected in the new wallet, suggesting that the move is proactive and may be part of a broader operational security measure rather than a response to market activity.
Meanwhile, Ledger CTO Charles Guillemet marked some op_ter_tern messages sent to those wallets on X, showing legal notices for those wallet owners.
A few days before the transfer, the old wallet received an OP_RET_RETURN message claiming to own the legal property of the coin unless the owner responds with a set deadline.
Guillemet noted that while some people fear a hack, the sender never proved private key access, targeting many dormant wallets, not just those eight wallets. Schedule indicates that the original owner might be frightened by the news and may have taken pre-emptive actions to relist controls.
“In the past, private keys have been compromised due to poor cryptographic practices such as predictable non-CE usage or low-quality random number generators, but this doesn’t seem to apply,” Guillemet said in an X post.
He added to other observations: “Pure coincidence: timing may be random. The real owner of 80,000 BTC saw the OP_Return message and moved the funds as a precaution.”
OP_Return is a Bitcoin feature that allows users to attach short messages or data to transactions without affecting the transmission of actual coins.
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