Mt. Gox is offline.

[randomness]

Remember Mt. Gox?

Wait, what do you mean "remember"?

Seems they've gone offline.

From a CNET story:

Embattled Bitcoin exchange Mt. Gox has largely vanished from the Internet amid accusations that the exchange is insolvent after a years-long theft that resulted in the loss of hundreds of millions of dollars.

The Web site for the Tokyo-based exchange has been wiped clean, as has its official Twitter feed. A screen shot posted by a Reddit user indicates that trading on the exchange has been halted.


The exchange's apparent shutdown was linked to an alleged hacking that went unnoticed for years, according to a purported internal Mt. Gox document circulating on the Internet. Labeled "Crisis strategy draft," the document reports that the exchange suffered a loss of 744,000 Bitcoins, about $350 million at Monday's trading, and outlines a scheme for restoring confidence in the exchange.

Comments

[hammercock.livejournal.com]

Not related to Mt. Gox, but this reminds me that the other day I heard that there is now a Bitcoin ATM at South Station. And you can use Bitcoin to pay for tasty food at Thelonious Monkfish in Central Square. I almost want to get maybe $30-40 worth of Bitcoin just to buy dinner there and say I did it. :)

[a-dodecahedron.livejournal.com]

Mt. Gox, AKA Magic: The Gathering Online eXchange.

[digitalemur.livejournal.com]

But what will the Magic players do now?!?

[achinhibitor.livejournal.com]

So at least someone got out the door with their money intact. It just wasn't the investors...

[nihilistic-kid.livejournal.com]

The best part—better than even the fact that the hack went unnoticed for years—was that the "scheme for restoring confidence" basically involved begging people with lots of coins to put them into Mt.Gox anyway, because community or something.

[a-dodecahedron.livejournal.com]

How could this have happened? Bitcoin is free of politics and human error. At least that's what the Winklevii told me.

[cerebralpaladin.livejournal.com]

My big question is how many of these crises Bitcoin can take before the whole thing collapses. I mean, I understand that people have a lot invested in the idea of Bitcoins (mostly mental commitment, but also lots of money), but how many BitInstant/Mt Gox/Silk Road/Sheep Marketplace massive thefts/losses/seizures/whatevers of Bitcoins can happen before people give up on the idea? Once people realize that they can't trust any of the Bitcoin markets, I don't think Bitcoin can survive. There isn't enough actual peer-to-peer use for it to work, as best as I can tell. So is this the time when it goes to functionally equivalent to 0? Or does it take a beating, stagger on, and then take another beating when the next scandal hits?