It appears that an extortionist is aiming to make life hard for certain bitcoin adopters.

It has been reported that during the final stages of his battle with ALS, early bitcoin enthusiast Hal Finney spent a long and arduous 30 minutes shivering on his front lawn while a SWAT team cleared his home.

It was the work of an alleged bitcoin extortionist, who after several failed attempts to extract $400,000 in bitcoin from Finney, finally used phone number spoofing technology to place a call to authorities from Finney’s home number and make the following claim… That he had killed two people in the house and would commit further harm to himself and to others if help didn’t arrive soon.

It is believed that Hal Finney was not the only victim of the alleged extortionist.  Back in March, bitcoin evangelist Roger Ver was threatened by what is believed to be the same person, who said that he would post Ver’s personal information online if he did not receive approximately $20,000 in bitcoin.

Finally, the city of Detroit is believed to have fallen prey to the same figure.  Earlier this year, the city lost control of an unused database and faced ransom demands from the intruder, who wanted 2,000 bitcoins in exchange for the site’s restoration.

How long do you all think it will take before bitcoin security is where it needs to be?  Post your comments and thoughts below.