Defendant Argues Bitcoin Addresses Cannot Be Sued in NY Lawsuit

A pseudonymous defendant has moved to dismiss a New York lawsuit seeking ownership of 39,069 dormant Bitcoin addresses, arguing that Bitcoin addresses are merely data strings that cannot be sued.

The defendant, identifying themselves as “John Doe 33,” filed a notice of appearance and motion to dismiss on Thursday, claiming they control one of the dormant wallets named in the lawsuit.

According to the motion, the lawsuit is legally defective because Bitcoin address strings are neither persons nor legal entities subject to the court's jurisdiction. The filing argues that a public Bitcoin address cannot itself be “found” under New York's lost-property law because it has always been publicly visible on the blockchain.

The filing challenges the lawsuit filed in May by plaintiff “Noah Doe” and two Wyoming-based LLCs, ABC Company and XYZ Company. The plaintiffs claim the Bitcoin tied to the listed addresses constitutes abandoned property that they reported to the New York Police Department and claimed under New York lost-property law.

Regardless of how the court rules on ownership, it remains unclear how the plaintiffs could recover any Bitcoin without possessing the private keys needed to access the wallets.

Defendant files a motion to dismiss the case seeking ownership of 39,069 Bitcoin wallets. Source: iapps.court.state.ny.us

The complaint lists 39,069 Bitcoin addresses, including wallet addresses widely associated with Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto and the Mt. Gox hacker. The listed wallets collectively hold an estimated 3.7 million BTC (worth about $234 billion), according to Sani, founder of Bitcoin analytics platform Timechain Index.

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Defendant appears to control $300 million Bitcoin wallet

Blockchain data suggests that “John Doe 33” controls a wallet holding 5,000 BTC received in April 2014 that has remained untouched for more than 12 years, making it worth more than $300 million at current prices, according to a Friday X post from Galaxy Digital head of research Alex Thorn.

“That's ~100x the median defendant address. This is a real holder with real standing choosing to fight, not a bystander.”

Source: Alex Thorn

Thorn added that the filing prevented what had been a “near-certain” default judgment and challenged jurisdictional and statutory defects in the plaintiffs' case.

The supply of Bitcoin has been dormant for the past five and 10 years. Source: Bitbo

There are currently 3.5 million BTC, worth about $215 billion, that have been dormant for the past 10 years and another 6.6 million coins, worth around $406 billion, that have been dormant for over five years, Bitbo data shows.