Former Mt. Gox CEO Mark Karpelès proposed a fundamental change to Bitcoin's code, aiming to recover approximately $5 billion in Bitcoin that has remained untouched since 2011. Karpelès, operating under the GitHub handle MagicalTux, submitted a pull request to Bitcoin Core that would redirect these long-dormant coins to a recovery address controlled by the MtGox trustee. The proposal involved a narrow change, requiring only a single consensus rule modification.
The pull request was automatically closed after only 17 hours, prior to any significant community discussion. Critics pointed out that such a proposal should have been initiated on developer mailing lists or forums, not directly on the Bitcoin Core GitHub. Furthermore, many MtGox creditors publicly stated their opposition, emphasizing the importance of Bitcoin's core principle that private keys equate to ownership over recovering their lost funds. They argued that rewriting Bitcoin's rules, even for a sympathetic case, would set a dangerous precedent, potentially leading to future requests for similar interventions from victims of other thefts or hacks. The network's integrity and predictability were prioritized over the recovery of the frozen $5 billion in Bitcoin, reinforcing the principle that 'code is law.'