Two British schoolboys stole nearly $1m in Bitcoin, US lawsuit claims

Two British schoolboys stole around $1m worth of Bitcoin from a Colorado man’s digital wallet and their families have refused to hand it back, a lawsuit claims.

Benedict Thompson and Oliver Read are accused in US court papers of being behind the 2018 theft, when they were still minors.

Andrew Schober alleges that he downloaded a crypto-wallet called “Electrum Atom”, and when he tried to transfer over 16.4 Bitcoins, which as of Thursday was worth around $770,000, computer malware they had designed instead directed it into an account they controlled.

“Here, Mr Schober believed he was communicating only with his own cryptocurrency wallet,” the lawsuit states.

“But because of the Malware, either Benedict or Oliver or both intercepted and altered the communications between Mr. Schober and the Bitcoin blockchain.”