Man who has two password guesses to claim £175m ‘has made peace’ with loss

A Bitcoin programmer "has made peace" with losing millions after failing to guess his password to access the fortune.

Stefan Thomas has just two attempts left to retrieve his £175 million savings.

However, the computer programmer said "time heals all wounds," after attempting the password eight times.

Mr Thomas was handed 7,002 bitcoins a decade ago in exchange for making an animation video about the cryptocurrency.

The large amount was stored in a small hard drive called and IronKey – which allows 10 attempts before encrypting the content forever, reports LadBible.

In 2012 he misplaced the password and has been trying ever since to retrieve it.

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The San Francisco native said: "There were sort of a couple weeks where I was just desperate, I don't have any other word to describe it," reports KGO-TV.

"You sort of question your own self-worth. What kind of person loses something that important?"

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He also spoke to the New York Times and said: "I got to a point where I said to myself, 'Let it be in the past, just for your own mental health'."

Previously the expert revealed he had two attempts left and said he had written the password down on a piece of paper.

He told The Sun that he would just lay in bed and think about it, desperately wracking his brain for the answer.

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"Then I’d go to the computer with some new strategy and it wouldn’t work and I’d be desperate again," he said.

The Silicon Valley programmer has also warned other savers to keep their passwords safe.

He said on Twitter: "I hope others can learn from my mistakes. Test your backups regularly to make sure they are still working.

For his own sanity he has now placed the IronKey in a secure facility and hopes to revisit attempts to access it, if someone comes up with a new way.

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