> It's very suspicious when a Bitcoin exchange claims problems on the deposit side and stops processing withdrawals.
I believe the problem is the following: if you deposit to a certain, old deposit address, that Bistamp has lost the private key to, the Bitstamp deposit system might credit your account with the bitcoins anyway, even though they are not there, because the private key is lost.
If you then withdraw bitcoins subsequently, you are literally withdrawing someone else's bitcoins, because the bitcoins you deposited never arrived, although the Bitstamp software architecture believes they are there, because the deposit address reflects a deposit -- Bitstamp just doesn't have the private key, so the balance of that address is irrelevant.
I believe the problem is the following: if you deposit to a certain, old deposit address, that Bistamp has lost the private key to, the Bitstamp deposit system might credit your account with the bitcoins anyway, even though they are not there, because the private key is lost.
If you then withdraw bitcoins subsequently, you are literally withdrawing someone else's bitcoins, because the bitcoins you deposited never arrived, although the Bitstamp software architecture believes they are there, because the deposit address reflects a deposit -- Bitstamp just doesn't have the private key, so the balance of that address is irrelevant.
That's one meaningful explanation, at least.