Exclusive: John McAfee says Bitfi hack was a “failed hack attempt” after company removes ‘unhackable’ tag

Over the months of July and August, there was a new wallet that raised a lot of eyebrows. The wallet, known as Bitfi, advertised itself as being “unhackable”, thus driving a whole team of security researchers in stripping the wallet’s every component down and compromising its security.

John McAfee, the former founder of McAfee Inc. also heavily promoted the wallet, going along with the company’s statement of the wallet being unhackable. However, the aforementioned group of security researchers succeeded in reportedly breaking the security of the wallet.

On the CoinsBank Blockchain Cruise, AMBCrypto approached John McAfee with this question. He began by denying that the wallet was hacked, and then went on to define the security of the wallet. He stated:

“I describe the security of the wallet as you can’t get the coins end of story. It’s a wallet. If it’s a safety deposit box in my bank and you go, ‘Yeah I can hack it. See I made the lock turn.’ I don’t give a shit, did you open it? No.”

The run-up to the wallet being ‘hacked’ involved people playing a game on it, gaining root access, and generally stripping down the framework of the device. McAfee maintained that the device had not been hacked according to his definition of the phrase, which means getting the coins on the wallet. He said:

“Don’t buy into I hacked it because I got root access or played a game on it. ”

However, security researcher Saleem Rashid on Twitter posted a video that showed him supposedly hacking the wallet using a cold boot method.

on a completely unrelated note, here is a @Bitfi6 being cold boot attacked. it turns out that rooting the device does not wipe RAM clean. who would have thought it!? ???? i feel this music is very appropriate for @Bitfi6 ???? pic.twitter.com/jpSnYBd9Vk — Saleem “Unhackable” Rashid (@spudowiar) 30 August 2018

McAfee stated that this was not verified by Bitfi and that it was not something anybody could verify. Moreover, he raised the bar for the hacker, offering him all the funds on his personal Bitfi wallet which comes up to $20 million. He stated:

“I’ll give him my personal wallet with $20 million on it if you take it it’s yours. He knows he can’t. I’m not going to fly to London for some idiot to look at my own wallet. I’ll give it to you if you come to me I’m not going out of my way I am sorry.”

Proceeding the attack by Rashid however, Bitfi accepted to remove the unhackable claim from their website and marketing materials. This seemed to be the end in the Bitfi saga, although McAfee still holds on to one. On the brand removing the unhackable tag, he stated:

“They may do what they want, it’s their company. I have one, I have looked into it, I created cyber-security, please god. If I say you can’t get the coin, you cant get the coins. I believe in it enough to let the guy come to my house, take my wallet. Hold it as long as [he] wants, take it apart, do what [he] wants. You will not get my money.”

McAfee called it a “failed hack attempt”, as a successful hack takes the funds on the wallet or at least a part of it.