Topic: Are there any smartphones out there that are hard wallets too? - page 3. (Read 638 times)

Some voices are not convinced that everything can be properly turned off, see https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/old-phone-as-cold-storage-5377997
And, in your case at least, the point it to not turn everything off and use it as every day smartphone, isn't it? And that's, by far, much riskier.

That's actually a good point when it comes to hotwallets too that come in the form of apps, extensions, you name it:

Recommended desktop wallets: BitPay, Exodus, Electrum.
Recommended web wallets: Coinbase, Metamask, Guarda.
Recommended mobile wallets: BitPay, Edge, Trust, Electrum, Blockchain.com.



Also, the question "why cram so much into the phone", has been asked so many times for the last 20 years. Humanity doesn't seem to care, and seems to constantly deviate towards innovation when it comes to smartphones.

I've read into the Saga phone the other post mentioned, and it does seem to service the market of people who want all four of security reliability convenience and mobility when it comes to hotwallets.

They have this thing called a "seed vault" https://github.com/solana-mobile/seed-vault-sdk
It's part of an open source software collection called the SMS or Solana Mobile Stack. https://github.com/solana-mobile/solana-mobile-stack-sdk

Anyone here that's good at reading code have any input on if something like this is good or not?

Why are you trying to cram another feature into your phone? It already has a great amount of functionality, which makes the phone a multi-tool. As is usually the case with devices that try to combine the functions of many others, the quality of the functionality turns out to be worse. That is, the phone can have a hardware wallet function, but the level of protection will be much lower, and the risk of losing it also increases, since you always and everywhere carry the phone with you in everyday life. This is not suitable for large sums, because you don't carry all your savings with you and is only acceptable for pocket money, the loss of which you can afford. It is better not to combine the hardware wallet with the phone and keep it in a safe place. Moreover, you will rarely use HW anyway.

We'll have to choose between security and reliability between convenience and mobility.

Are you talking about this? I'm pretty sure sentiment on Solana was rather low because of what the magic television box is telling uninformed investors, but nevertheless this is cool to see. I'm pretty sure this is the closest thing that would satisfy what I'm looking for.

You say its optimal for hot wallet use and not cold storage, does that mean that storing a lot of crypto on it is unsafe? Period? I wanna see where it says "unhackable hardware wallet in a smartphone" somewhere, ideally. So far it's only in my dreams.



Also, holy moly 2017 account with 2 posts lmao. ._.

Passport looks more user-friendly than cold card, good thing it's an open source fork.

also ok this thing is cool lol.




At the end of the day, even with the evolution of cold wallets, the way they are APPEARING to look suggests they are evolving into phones themselves.

The reason I say this is because Ledger is releasing the "stax", and it's totally worth a look if you haven't seen it. Apparently the guy who was heavily involved with the popular iPod nano designed it.

Am I the only one that sees this?

There are some hardware wallets that look like phones but they are actually hardware wallets, in first place this is Passport hardware wallet by Foundation.
Passport started as ColdCard fork but with open source software and hardware, with added improvements and much better look.
Keystone wallet also looks like smaller smartphone, and it only functions as hardware wallet.

You can use old smartphones for coins but I would not consider it to be safe as hardware wallet for several reasons, but you can use them in combination with other hardware wallets.

One guy even used old Nokia phone to turn it into Bitcoin wallet:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/nokia-hardware-wallet-5420438

WiPhone can also be used for some Bitcoin wallet project:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/wiphone-hardware-wallet-project-5403646

Has anyone seen the Solana Saga phone? Agree that relying on a phone's hardware wallet could lead to issues- but using it like a hot wallet could dramatically improve the user experience for mobile transactions

@Charles-Tim

I think you meant you can have it on airplane mode but it can easily be turned off, right?
https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8504489

Guy says he had his airplane mode turned off by itself while in his pocket. As a result, he had to pay carrier roaming fees and he wasn't too thrilled about it. He wanted apple to refund him.

Someone replied that they would never refund him over something like that because "airplane mode never turns off by itself".

Hardware wallet are more secure than online wallets, but they are mostly connected to SPV client which makes them not private. Just as you can use Tor with other wallets, it can helps in anonymity, not security.

You have your phone on airplane mode, but it can easily be turned on. To discourage that kind of habit, it is best to remove the WiFi, Bluetooth, NFC and other components that can be used to connect to other devices and to the internet.

I see. You make solid points. I take it the main issue with being online is non-consensual touchy touchy from adversaries?

Also, could the phone just have an isolated operating system inside of it that doesn’t actually recognize the exterior operating system of the phone, but can still function to sign transactions? When I say recognize, I more mean each other. They both use the same screen but don’t know each other exist in the same piece of hardware.

Thanks again, Dave.

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For sure, phone's security are terrible when they are online. But and intermediate can do things like:

1.) Get a VPN and set it to where it's on as soon as the phone turns on.
2.) Airplane mode and connect to a secure internet connection
3.) Virtual Machines (Although I have read before that there could be malware out there designed to escape virtual machines).

Fillippone comes in hot with validation risks right off the bat in the 2019 thread.


And it's true, open source is the only desirable form of software because you can verify it. Also, there he goes, mentioning that if you have a crypto phone, one can immediately point you out. On the flipside of that, don't we want something that everyone can easily adopt? I think phones might be the answer but they are so shit for crypto right now.

Furthermore, the 2021 thread you linked mostly had people discussing corporations and how their closed source hardware might not appeal to bitcoin holders. And that shit is definitely going to be closed source bet on your mama.

Mod note: consecutive posts merged

It is, but it was discussed and it's a very bad idea (read below). Plus, it makes the phone unnecessarily more expensive for people not needing that feature, hence not good for business.


Unless that monkey also steals you (or a picture of you) or your finger, or the last items you've had your fingerprints on.
No. Phone security is weak and "the monkey" may move your money out before you even notice the phone is missing.

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And about your initial question, I think hat Samsung had ideas in that direction, but a quick search has only revealed this topic (2021) and this one (2019) on the matter.

No, and you would not want one anyway.
A hardware wallet should be 100% offline.
No potential for it to send data someplace or for some other way to connect without the user physically doing it.

No potential for someone to install apps that may compromise security no possibility to run something that should not be run and so on.

-Dave

Sort of like a ledger or cold card but a phone as well?

Or is this impossible and we will always need dedicated hardware that is separate from devices like phones and computers for security reasons when it comes to large amounts of coin?

Is there a way to add hardware into a phone that is separate from the phone itself but can still interact with it from the inside to sign transactions and truly keep your bitcoins in your phone?

And if someone stole the phone, they still have to unlock it with possibly a passcode, Face ID, Touch ID, and any other walls of security such as passwords to open apps.

I’ll have plenty of time to restore a wallet real quick I guess while the monkey whole stole my phone tries to get inside it. That’s if he knows there’s crypto on it to begin with. Then again, a crypto phone would make any thief more likely to assume there are coins on it versus coins not being on it.

The war on OpSec when it comes to phones is never ending because every human has one lol.

Thanks guys. Much love.