BITCOIN SEASON 2: Bitcoin "Dusting" Attack You Didn't Know About W/ Galaxy Digital

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4.7 • 698 Ratings

🗓️ 18 October 2025

⏱️ 33 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Galaxy Digital's Zach Pokorny reveals shocking details about the 80,000 BTC whale movement and a massive dusting campaign targeting 2.3 million Bitcoin across 40,000+ addresses with fake legal notices. Zach Pokorny from Galaxy Digital joins us to discuss their deep investigation into the mysterious 80,000 Bitcoin whale that moved last summer. The report uncovers a massive dusting campaign targeting over 40,000 addresses holding 2.3 million BTC with fake "abandoned property" notices. We dive into the Salomon Brothers connection, the $90K cost of the attack, and why this looks like classic Craig Wright-style lawfare. Subscribe to the newsletter! https://newsletter.blockspacemedia.com Notes: • 2.3 million BTC dusted • 40,000+ addresses hit • Attack cost 0.7 BTC (~$90,000) • 80,000 BTC whale sold through Galaxy • 3-year dormancy minimum targeted Timestamps: 00:00 Start 02:27 Size & breadth of the messaging campaign 04:39 Message contents 05:51 Legal definitions 08:47 Is Salomon Brothers real? 12:02 Why not use a law firm? 13:06 Did the 80k BTC seller get spooked? 14:31 Scale of the campaign 15:35 Satoshi addresses? 17:55 How did they choose addresses? 19:44 Lots of holders have "dormant coins" 21:17 Cost of the campaign 23:14 Links to other attacks 26:26 Speculating who this was 28:12 Court process & jurisdiction 32:12 Wrap up - 👋Bitcoin Season 2 is produced Blockspace Media, Bitcoin’s first B2B publication in Bitcoin. Follow us on Twitter and check out our newsletter for the best information in Bitcoin mining, Ordinals and tech! Enjoy the show? Check out our website and newsletter by clicking here. Questions or want to sponsor? hello@blockspace.media

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome back to Bitcoin Season 2. So you remember that 80,000 Bitcoin whale that moved over the summer,
0:06.8	that then later was revealed to have been liquidated or sold those Bitcoin by Galaxy Digital?
0:12.5	Well, at the time, you may remember there was a bunch of conspiracy theory around who this was and what was happening.
0:19.6	In particular, one detail is that supposedly there were some messages sent to the addresses
0:26.7	of this Bitcoin whale identifying this Bitcoin as abandoned.
0:30.8	Well, guess what?
0:31.9	We actually have some resolution on this.
0:34.3	Galaxy Digital researchers put together a deep dive on this and it goes way
0:39.3	deeper and is way more interesting than
0:41.5	you imagine. I've got one of the co-authors
0:43.6	of that report with me
0:45.6	on this pod today. Welcome
0:47.3	back to Bickland Season 2. Let's kick it off.
1:02.2	Welcome back. It's me and Colin. We are joined by Zach Picorni. How do we say your last name, Zach?
1:04.3	Exactly. Yeah, one shot at it.
1:08.9	Oh, sweet. Okay. Nice. That's why I'm in podcasting because I can say last names.
1:12.1	Yeah, so Zach, we've got you.
1:18.1	You teamed up with another friend of the pod, Will Owens, on this research report.
1:24.9	I will just jump in and give a little bit of context beyond just the hook I did at the top.
1:30.2	So there were some 80,000 Bitcoin last summer and they started moving and immediately the conspiracy theorists like go all a Twitter and come up with
1:36.1	all sorts of interesting things and angles. Later on, Galaxy reveals, hey, we sold this Bitcoin
1:42.2	for the client, put a cool press release in Opterrne on it.
	...

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