Former Mt. Gox founder retreats to Japan to do VPN, bids farewell to Bitcoin and shifts focus to AI agents

Mt. Gox former CEO Mark Karpelès has retreated to Japan. He experienced the storm of 650,000 BTC theft, served time in Japanese prison, and went through bankruptcy liquidation. Now, he is shifting his focus to VPN privacy protection technology and AI agent development. Karpelès currently serves as the protocol lead at vp.net, building a VPN service that allows users to verify themselves. Surprisingly, he no longer holds Bitcoin.

From the Ruins of Exchanges to Privacy Technology Pioneer

Karpelès’s new company vp.net adopts Intel SGX technology, enabling users to verify the actual code running on the server. Karpelès describes this as a trustless, self-verifiable VPN mode. He is also quietly developing an unreleased AI agent system on his personal cloud platform shells.com. This system grants AI control over full virtual machines, allowing it to install software, manage emails, and potentially complete shopping through credit card integration in the future. Karpelès states that the goal is to give AI a complete computer, so it can freely manipulate it. If successful, this will be a comprehensive upgrade of AI proxy capabilities.

This technological choice is no coincidence. After the Mt. Gox trust collapse, Karpelès deeply understands the fragility of centralized trust. The verifiable architecture of vp.net is a response to this painful experience, allowing users to confirm the system’s operation through cryptographic proofs instead of blind trust in service providers. This “trust no one, verify yourself” philosophy is in line with Bitcoin’s core principles, shifting the application scenario from currency to internet privacy.

The Rise and Fall of Mt. Gox and the Robbers’ Cloud of Suspicion

Karpelès’s current situation starkly contrasts with his position at the center of the Bitcoin storm fifteen years ago. In 2010, Karpelès ran a server company called Tibanne. When a French customer living in Peru was unable to conduct international transactions smoothly, they started accepting Bitcoin payments, becoming one of the earliest companies to adopt Bitcoin. He often gathered with early Bitcoin community figures; Bitcoin Jesus Roger Ver was a regular at his office, and Karpelès’s servers once hosted the Silk Road dark web domain.

This connection later drew the attention of US law enforcement, even leading to suspicions that he might be a digital clone of Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht: Dread Pirate Roberts. The suspect behind that account was involved in murder-for-hire, cryptocurrency money laundering, and online drug trafficking. Ulbricht vehemently denied being Dread Pirate Roberts, but US authorities listed Karpelès as a suspect. Ultimately, who exactly is Dread Pirate Roberts remains a Rorschach case, unsolved to this day.

In 2011, Karpelès acquired Mt. Gox from Jed McCaleb. During the transfer, about 80,000 BTC had already been stolen, but this was not disclosed to users immediately. After taking over, he tried to fix technical issues and establish compliance policies. Amid the rapid popularization of Bitcoin, Mt. Gox once handled the majority of global Bitcoin transactions. In 2014, Mt. Gox collapsed due to a massive hacking incident, with over 650,000 BTC stolen. Subsequent investigations linked the case to BTC-e exchange and Alexander Vinnik. Vinnik pleaded guilty in the US but was sent back to Russia during a prisoner exchange, and the case evidence was sealed.

Prison Life Unexpectedly Sparks a Health Revolution

In August 2015, Karpelès was arrested and imprisoned in Japan for about 11 and a half months. According to recent reports, Karpelès is now in excellent condition, successfully managing his weight, and appears very energetic—looking twenty years younger in recent photos. He even revealed that his sleep quality was excellent during his incarceration in Japan, and prison life greatly improved his health.

Three Unexpected Gains from Prison Transformation

Restored Routine: As CEO of Mt. Gox, he was a workaholic, often sleeping only two hours a night and suffering from long-term sleep deprivation. Prison restored his regular sleep schedule and forced him to break free from his workaholic lifestyle.

Unexpected Social Experience: His cellmates included gang members, drug dealers, and scammers. He spent time teaching English to pass the time. After prison guards saw news about him in the newspapers, they nicknamed him “Bitcoin Mr.”

Mental Focus Training: During detention in Tokyo, he was held in solitary confinement for over half a year, only passing time through reading and writing. Ultimately, relying on extensive accounting records, he successfully overturned major charges of embezzlement, only being convicted of document forgery.

There was even a gang member who tried to recruit him, secretly giving him a phone number to contact after release. He told the media he would definitely not make that call. After release, his physique changed dramatically, and he now looks better than when he was young, astonishing the Bitcoin community.

Farewell to Bitcoin: A Deep Critique of Centralization Trends

Surprisingly, Karpelès states he personally no longer holds Bitcoin, but his company accepts Bitcoin as a payment method. When discussing Bitcoin’s current state, he criticized the centralization risks posed by ETFs and figures like Michael Saylor. As Mt. Gox’s bankruptcy proceedings transitioned to a civil reorganization, creditors could file claims using Bitcoin. Rumors once circulated that Karpelès might have gained enormous wealth from remaining assets, but he repeatedly denied this, expressing hope that creditors could recover the maximum assets.

He also criticized FTX, saying it was crazy to use QuickBooks to account for a company worth billions of dollars. Today, Karpelès is again collaborating with Roger Ver, but remains cautious about Bitcoin’s current situation. He believes that mathematics and technology are trustworthy, but human nature is unreliable. This critique of Bitcoin’s institutionalization, coming from someone who once stood at the center of cryptocurrency and witnessed its darkest moments, is particularly persuasive.