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James Howells and the Lost Bitcoin Fortune

In 2013, James Howells, a British IT worker, accidentally threw away an old hard drive containing 8,000 bitcoins he mined in 2009, back when Bitcoin was almost worthless. Years later, as Bitcoin’s value skyrocketed, he realized the hard drive was worth billions of dollars—but it was buried in a landfill in Newport, Wales.

Despite numerous attempts to convince local authorities to let him excavate the landfill, citing plans to use advanced technology like AI and robots, his requests were denied due to environmental and safety concerns.

To this day, the hard drive remains lost, a reminder of the high stakes of digital assets—where a single mistake can mean losing a fortune forever.