Former Mt Gox chief executive Mark Karpelès has reflected on the 2014 collapse of the once-dominant bitcoin exchange and his subsequent detention in Japan.
Karpelès now lives a low-profile life in Japan, working on privacy, cloud computing and artificial intelligence projects.
He currently serves as chief protocol officer at vp.net, a VPN that allows users to verify server code using secure hardware technology.
Karpelès is also developing an AI automation system through his personal cloud platform shells.com.
He said the tools are designed to give artificial intelligence full control over virtual machines.
Fifteen years ago, Karpelès ran Mt Gox when it processed the majority of global bitcoin trading volume.
His involvement with bitcoin began in 2010 after a client requested to pay for hosting services using the digital currency.
He’s the one who discovered Bitcoin, and asked me if he could use Bitcoin to pay for my services.
Mark Karpelès said.
In 2011, Karpelès acquired Mt Gox from Jed McCaleb amid unresolved technical and security issues.
He claimed that tens of thousands of bitcoins were stolen before he gained full control of the exchange.
Mt Gox later collapsed in 2014 after more than 650,000 bitcoins were drained through long-running hacks.
The stolen funds were later linked to Alexander Vinnik and the now-defunct BTC-e exchange.
It doesn’t feel like justice has been served.
Mark Karpelès said.
Japanese authorities arrested Karpelès in 2015, holding him for nearly a year under strict detention conditions.
He described repeated rearrests and prolonged solitary confinement as mentally exhausting.
They really make you think that you’re free and yeah, no, not you’re not free.
Mark Karpelès said.
Karpelès eventually disproved key embezzlement charges using thousands of pages of accounting records.
He was later convicted only on minor record falsification counts and released on bail.
Karpelès said he does not personally own bitcoin today, though his businesses still accept it.
He criticised growing centralisation risks in crypto markets, including exchange-traded funds.
This is a recipe for catastrophe.
Mark Karpelès said.
At the time of reporting, Bitcoin price was $87,235.99.