
In January 2025, the crypto world got a grim reality check. David Balland, a co-founder of Ledger—the French firm behind those ubiquitous hardware wallets—found himself at the center of a violent kidnapping. Alongside his wife, he was snatched from their home in central France, thrust into a nightmare where cryptocurrency wasn’t just a tool for wealth, but a ransom demand. This wasn’t a hack or a phishing scam—it was a flesh-and-blood crime that tested the intersection of blockchain tech and real-world risks.… Read More »