Desperate problems, you know, hopeless solutions.

In 2013, James Howells, a computer engineer, became a rare—or not so rare—bird among the magnates: a millionaire without millions. Or rather, his millions get lost in a big dump in the form of tons of chicken bones, diapers, and Bitcoins buried under his shell. Now, after years of trying to find them, he has a solution to finding the hard drive that houses them like a futuristic treasure chest. And almost as bizarre as the challenge: summoning two private detectives, two Spot robot dogs from Boston Dynamics.

The Howells case is worthy of the scariest scenario of any technological tragicomedy. We’ve already talked about him on some occasions here. Around 2009, the engineer mined 7,500 to 8,000 Bitcoins as an “experiment” at home – the exact amount varies from one version to the next – a generous amount that he then stores, saves, and forgets on an old hard drive. .

It may sound crazy to us today, but back then, when Howells was taking his first steps with cryptocurrencies, a Bitcoin was worth almost nothing. A few years later, in August 2013, Welsh, tired of seeing all those old junk in the drawers, decided. throw the disk in the trash along with a few bare wires and a broken mouse. And with it, of course, cryptocurrencies are gone.

A treasure under tons of rubbish

When he realized the big blunder only a few months later — New Yorker— He saw a BBC report about a young Norwegian who paid a down payment on an apartment with a thousand Bitcoin earnings. Before it was dumped, Howells was worth between $7,500 and $8,000, and this fall 2013 it was already worth $1.4 million. And up. This was also for a decent and luxurious apartment.

But it was more difficult for the Newport engineer to profit from them than the happy miner in Oslo. Reason: Your Bitcoins are already buried Under the bags, bags and more bags with the debris of their neighbors. Embarrassed, not really wanting to tell her story, Howells let time pass without sharing it with anyone. It was silent. Bitcoin soared. And the error, as he would later admit, was growing like a big snowball.

When his old hard drive was already worth six million, he decided to take action.

Since then, Howells has moved heaven and earth to let him take out the trash at the local dump. He quit his job, contacted the city council, went to the Welsh and English Parliament, garnered the support of investors willing to fund the complex and expensive bailout, and even lured his biggest stumbling block, Newport City Council, to ensure the maneuver would fail. they were successful and recovered the hard drive, you can keep 25% of the money.

It didn’t do him much good. Even though the person in charge of the landfill calculated that the hard drive was thrown into an area that could be limited to 250 m2 – garbage management also makes sense – the local authorities, who should actually allow the work, were not convinced. Howells and his associates take out the garbage in town. “Their suggestions a significant ecological risk We cannot accept it,” emphasizes the municipality.

Now Howells has decided to find an alternative and capitalize on two allies worthy of his strange story. in an interview with Business Content He announced that he wanted to use two Boston Dynamics Spot robot dogs equipped with CCTV cameras.

His idea is scan the floor, just like two real hounds looking for the lost hard drive. The idea may not be entirely remote. Boston’s devices had previously been used for tasks as diverse as scanning or grazing construction projects.

Putting your plan into action will not be easy. First, because of the cost it represents. Spot went on sale in 2020 for around €73,000 per unit, much more than Howells could afford thanks to funding from two venture capital investors. In total, he calculates that completing the entire operation will require a payment of 10.77 million euros.

In addition to robots, the engineer plans to build facilities next to the landfill where a team of experts in artificial intelligence, excavation, waste management and data extraction can easily maneuver. Purpose: find the coveted record shot nine years ago.

The second major “but” for the engineer to overcome is the unwillingness of the City Council, which has repeatedly refused to remove the rubble over the past few years and remains reluctant even today. “There is nothing to offer us,” he explained recently. Business.

It’s not just against Howells the bureaucratic hurdles, the ransom cost, or the tons of junk that separates him from his coveted hard drive and bitcoin content. Perhaps your greatest enemy is time and cryptocurrency fluctuations. At the end of 2021, the crypto treasury was worth more than 315 million euros. Today, just seven months later, but after the ups and downs and depreciation, his 7,500 bitcoins would already be around $160 million.

The story, of course, is up there with the best treasure hunt.