To bit or not to bit

Around three years ago Amir Taaki, a London-based code-writer linked to the free software movement, and Donald Norman, a young American entrepreneur, set up the British bitcoin exchange Intersango. In an E&T interview at the time, they were both full of youthful idealism and keen to ensure Intersango was secure and ticked the right regulatory boxes. Today, Taaki lives in the Calafou commune in Barcelona and works on the Dark Wallet bitcoin project backed by Cody Wilson of Liberator 3D-printed gun fame, named by Wired Magazine as one of the '15 Most Dangerous People in the World'. Both Taaki and Norman are also subjects of a $500,000 lawsuit filed in August 2012 in San Francisco by four bitcoin investors who lost money on an exchange called Bitcoinica, which was acquired by Intersango that year. Bitcoinica was a cloud-based exchange - built in five days by a Singaporean teenager - that was hacked before and after Intersango acquired it.