Topic: Are you running your BTC wallet on Linux? Why? (Read 559 times)

short answer: windows, apple - spyware

gates created digital viruses (windows) and now he's creating real "viruses" (vaccines)

apple has so many back doors and regulatory bs - i don't trust the big corporations - they all working towards a common agenda behind the facade of government

linux/open-source is the way however i don't trust ubuntu - i think that's been infiltrated by big corp also by the looks of it

There is no need for hackers to hack Linux as almost all distros with Secure Boot (including Red Hat, Ubuntu, Debian, and SUSE) have vulnerability which allows RCE attacks. Thus the door has been always open.

Any Bitcoin wallet  should rely on the cold air-gapped machine rather than on OS, whatever the latter. The cold machine may be run by any OS which  is of little significance in this case.

Linux operating system has very strong security system which is not easily hacked by hackers and more high performance access is available in Linux which is not available in Windows.  And Linux is considered as a powerful and secure operating system so Bitcoin wallet is Undoubtedly to run on Linux. I like to use Linux myself but it's a hassle to set up so sometimes I have to move to Windows

Alright, I'm not going to point out Linux's advantages over Windows; plenty of other users have already mentioned them. I've always used Windows and am currently storing Bitcoin on my Electrum wallet, knowing that it's not the safest option. Linux may be open source and safer, but a few years ago I struggled using it because it has no correlation with Windows and I have zero knowledge of how it operates; it's a completely different operating system. Personally, I wouldn't use it as my main OS; it seems a little complicated and restricted compared to Windows. Perhaps I'd use it with dual boot and isolate it completely for my Bitcoin wallet, but it's certainly not to my preference.

FYI both Kali and Arch Linux aren't newbie/beginner friendly. Arch Linux installation require you to setup so many things manually, which is why they provide long guide[1]. And partitioning problem could be partiality avoided if you either,
1. Allocate dedicated SSD/HDD for linux.
2. Use beginner friendly distro which do it automatically.


Not true. As i mentioned on previous page, you can perform dual boot. In addition, these days linux have good hardware support.


That's okay if you're willing to spend money, especially when some paid AV use monthly or yearly subscription which is costly on long run. And would you trust paid AV when it's free version got caught stealing and selling user personal data[2]?

[1] https://wiki.archlinux.org/title/Installation_guide
[2] https://www.tomsguide.com/news/avast-avg-data-collection

As a general advice, do not leave your money in a hot wallet, which is the one that connects to the Internet and uses it in daily life, because errors happen and you may sometimes need to click on a link or do anything.
Therefore, it is better to store your money in cold storage, and if it is necessary to use a hot wallet, then Linux is preferable.
This is if you are careful not to click links at random or give permissions to closed source applications.

Of course, nothing is 100% safe, everything has its risks. But as I know, using the Windows operating system will be more dangerous and vulnerable to attack than using the Linux or macOS operating system. I don't know the truth because I'm not an IT. I am also planning to buy an old computer and use Linux to store and trade cryptocurrencies. Currently, I am also using Windows like you, and I have not encountered any problems during use. So I'm still wondering whether to use Linux or not.

There is no computer OS that's prone to hacks, even the less loved Mac OS have some malicious things available on the internet, if you are not careful running your Mac OS you will get in trouble fast, so don't go and download Linux OS because some people are saying it's open source and also less vulnerable to hack, there are millions of malicious software for Linux OS too and there are trojans and viruses that are targeting Linux OS users too.

Be careful where you download software for your Linux OS and stay away from torrent downloading, I am a Windows OS users and I am free of trojans and malware because I am very careful will what I do on my PC.

Do not download your Windows OS online, buy from Microsoft Direct.

Always make sure your Windows OS security is up to date.

Be careful which website to visit.

Avoid airdrop hunting on your PC.

Windows - swiss cheese
Linux - Silicon

It's a lot harder to penetrate silicon successfully in comparison to swiss cheese, which it already has holes.

The reason I didn't call Linux concrete is because there are still ways for users to go wrong with it. Though it's a lot better than Windows, by magnitudes.

We discussed this quite in detail over in the Cybersecurity & Privacy board, which a lot of us community members hope to be able to discuss more to help others stay secure in the event that the board is added.

It's the first time I am hearing that many people are switching to Linux. Among my friends we are all using Windows or Apple, as far as I know nobody switched to Linux yet. My knowledge of the OS is very limited, I know that it's more secure than windows but also harder to operate. You can probably quickly learn how to use LinuxOS, the real question is if it's really worth it. First of all you need a new laptop or PC only for Linux, which creates more work as you need to keep the second system up to date. Why not just buy a good anti-virus system for windows? We can increase our security on windows and don't need to worry so much anymore about a virus or a scam attack.

Yes windows is very unsafe. I remember installing a new fresh copy of Windows7 and right out of the box there was some malware already due to some bugs. After the service packs were installed it seemed fine but shows you how unsafe and targeted it can be.

Whether you use windows or Linux you need to use a cold storage or hardware wallet approach. Don’t keep your private keys or seeds on an online computer ever. You can use something such as electrum which is free and can have a fool proof wallet solution.

Yeah, tried to dual boot before , I allocated the larger partition to windows because we all know how heavy that os will be and how many drivers and such are needed in that unlike in linux , it is lightweight and many distro and flavor. Already tried using Ubuntu since most of my friend said that ubuntu is good for beginner like me and then I got interested in Kali because I got interested in cybersec . I also tried Arch Linux but I failed to installed it I don't know why. Currently using Linux mint as well for crypto , but most of the time I used mac now because of work. So for me in terms of security of assets better to use linux, it is kinda hard to use at first when you are not yet so techy you might got a problem in your hardware as well if you failed to partition it correctly.

But OP should also get the context why "Linux is less-targeted by hackers". It's because, like the Mac, there are less users who are using Linux for the desktop, compared to those users who are using Microsoft Windows. There are still many exploits for unpatched versions of Linux that can be found in the internet, although not as many as the malware/virus made and released for Windows.

Precisely. To be honest Linux is really fun — customizing as much stuff and all that (I also used to love tinkering with Android ROMs). It's just that you have to always have that available time and leisure to fix stuff if something breaks, which is something I currently don't have. For some reason things break on me when I needed my computer the most, like they can smell fear or something lol.

I would guess it has to do with recent news headlines such as the following.


The overall stability and reliability of windows operating systems has declined noticeably in recent years. One critical example of this is windows defender anti virus. You can't turn it off. Everyday it activates itself and runs in the background causing everything to freeze or lag noticeably.

When my C drive was filled to capacity. Windows no longer had space to install updates. This broke windows and made it difficult to install other apps on other drives.

Game compatibility and overall windows support are the only reasons to use it. Everything else about windows is probably inferior to linux atm.

the difference is that Windows would often stay broken forever and randomly break out of nowhere. Remember the xp usb device prompt? "Remember my settings, don't ask me again" was one of the checkboxes on that prompt, and for something like 12-15 years, Mammonsoft forget to mention they meant "...except next time you insert a usb device, when this prompt will appear yet again"

with linux, things about the settings do randomly break. And the beauty is, that you can always fix it yourself, as long as you know what to do. Teaching yourself what to do is part of the whole point of it, and it's always possible to do so

with windows, either someone fixed it or they didn't. and you might be out of luck. I haven't used windows for about 15 years already.

Maybe Arch and the binary rolling distros, not Gentoo. There is nothing more rock solid than a distro that compiles its packages with the same libraries that are actually present in the system. How often do you update? When you want. I have left Gentoo installs without updating half a year or a year, it still works rock solid, unlike binary distros including LTS with packages from 3 years ago...

Arch has a rule you cannot break: Upgrade all the system, not a single package. This is not a problem with Gentoo, because you will compile it against whatever you really have. Instability comes from downloading binaries that were compiled against slightly different libraries. A bit of workaround is shipping those libraries with the binary, windows style, which is why snap and others are becoming popular in some distros.

The other reason is bloat and stuff you don't need. With Gentoo you can customize your compiles, and remove things you will never use resulting in a leaner and more stable experience. It is not for newbies, but the end result is far more stable than anything else i have ever seen or used. Still for a production server something like Debian Stable or Ubuntu LTS is ok, especially when you have several to manage.

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If you just want to use a system without getting your money stolen, just run something like Lubuntu, Linux lite, Pop_OS!, Linux Mint, etc. Its not perfection but its far better than windows. You still need to use "common" sense like using proper passwords, keeping security updates, etc.

Move your money related activities to Linux or BSD, preferably to a separate PC.

It's most definitely the first one. My laptop back then was quite a new model (I assume this was the reason) hence why I had to do a good chunk of modifications for the drivers to work. Either the fact that software support for my hardware specs wasn't that good back then, or that I messed something up in the process of trying to make it work.

This is the same with if you are new to anything. There is of course a learning curve. But again, I've found online guides and online communities much more helpful with Linux than with Windows. Not to mention that with Linux you can actually fix the problem, whereas with Windows it seems half the time you have to do some crazy work around or just get told "Tough luck, that's how Windows works".

Or perhaps that I'm simply running software specifically designed for Linux, rather than trying to get Windows software such as gaming engines to run on Linux.

The only time I use Windows is on computers at work, where obviously I don't have a choice. On more than one occasion I've been in the middle of a very time critical task, and you get a little box that goes "Hahaha, I'm going to restart in 5 minutes, fuck you" and there is nothing you can do about it. It's not just annoying; it's actively dangerous. I have no idea why anyone would choose to use such an OS.

Usually the reasons why things break on Linux suddenly are:

1. Your drivers are the ones breaking (very susceptible culprit)
2. You're not using an LTS distro - particularly true if you're running Arch or Gentoo.
3. Not trying to blame the user here, but maybe you compiled something from source but did not follow the instructions correctly so the program you just compiled is not running as you expected.

I guess it's just the fact that you're probably far more technically-literate than I am hence things break a lot less on your side.

But yea, I'm never freakin touching Windows again after how many times it decided to force update on me.


Yea Steam games mostly works fine. I used to play a lot of Valorant though, and afaik EpicGames still doesn't support Linux.

There should not be any qualitative difference when it comes to running your wallet over Windows or Linux, the difference is that Linux is a safer and more robust OS than Windows, if you are unwilling to give up the convenience of Windows the solution is easy, install Linux in a laptop you may not be using, a fully updated Linux can be made to run under very low specifications as long as you know what you are doing, and in this way you can keep your main computer running Windows while your coins are more secure in a wallet installed under Linux.

Sure, most important advantage is that Linux is open source, they don't spy on you like wiNd0ws, and there are not so many malware made for Linux os.
That means you won't have to use any antivirus software, and you will generally be safer with anything related with Bitcoin and crypto wallets.
There are many Linux distributions, but I would start with Fedora, Debian or Linux Mint.

There is nothing ''great'' about that, most Bitcoin wallets including Electrum works the same way on Linux like on wiNd0ws.
After initial learning curve you will not notice much difference and you will never think of getting back to spy os again.

I've also never used Linux, but as far as I know, Linux os is more secure than windows os, less hacky, and stuff like that. I have been using the Windows operating system for the past 13 years since I learned how to use a computer until now and have not had any problems with it. Nothing is safe when your computer is connected to the internet, the safest way is to use a hardware wallet or a computer without an internet connection. The operating system is not a big issue.

Currently using Linux Mint^[1] specifically for cryptocurrency purposes installed on a separate laptop. I only switched to Linux Mint because it is considered to be lightweight as compared to Windows which makes my laptop considerably slow.

The only annoying thing about Linux is that if you are new, troubleshooting consumes a lot of time fixing the issue. Plus, there are always updates like twice or thrice every week. All in all, electrum and Ledger live works pretty well in this OS.

[1] https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/m.60691281

Don't forget that Windows comes bundled so much bloatware it is unreal. A quick internet search tells me a fresh, clean install of Windows 11 is now 18 GB. Each extra piece of unnecessary software, unnecessary code, bloatware, spyware, adware, etc., is an extra attack surface to be exploited.

My experience is the opposite. Once I have my new Linux distro set up and running as I like it, it tends to continue to run smoothly with little to no issues. My limited experience with Windows is that it will often automatically apply updates or new software packages you didn't ask for, reboot when you didn't want it to, then run in to some problem installing the new packages, have to roll it back, reboot a few more times, and throw a few errors in the process.

Personally I've used Ubuntu, Mint, and Pop!_OS. And yea, obviously there's a reason why things break, but the typical user would definitely have a hard time fixing stuff.

I personally enjoy tinkering and customizing Linux systems (can't say much about fixing stuff), but gahddamn does it require a good amount of time and effort.

What linux distro are you talking about exactly?

Yes, it's easy to break and some distros take some troubleshooting before you get it stable...but saying that things "can randomly break out of nowhere" on Linux is quite abstract and a bit misleading. Every distro is different, generally, things don't just "break randomly" as a common theme on every single different linux distribution.

Linux is safer, better made and also most distributions don't spy on you like Windows does.
However, I also use Windows on the daily basis, hence my Electrum also runs on Windows.
But this is OK, since I know how bad Windows can be, hence I've done some things that should keep my funds secure:
1. I use my Electrum with a hardware wallet.
2. I always double check the addresses when sending money or when posting my addresses, since clipboard malware is widely spread.

Almost anything. I'm personally a huge fan of Linux as well, but I hate the fact that things can randomly break out of nowhere. Maybe it's just me not being able to configure everything correctly, but yea. Stability is an issue imo; at least for the not-super-technically-literate person.

Also, gaming sucks on Linux. (Though it's getting better).

This is the best suggestion to immediately create a secure operating system to host your wallet.

After you have done that, create another operating system which you can get to know linux. Linux mint is a popular choice. There are much better, more secure out-of-the-box options than that out there though. Do a deep dive into the web and try as many as you like. When you find your favorite, then go ahead and use it daily.

Windows is terrible. As o_e_l_e_o said, the whole OS should be considered spyware. The quicker you evade it, the quicker you will be better off.

It depends on how you manage the security despite if use Linux. I have a friend who got hacked even if he use Linux, and I have a friend who has used windows but never got hacked. In bitcoin, if you understand how to save it, whatever OS do you used, you will save. the important thing is you are not careless, you don't save private key on PC or online, and you don't show off your crypto wealth.

It's more on security just like most the above posts mentioned. But don't assumed that linux OS users are inevitable to hacks, most hack incident are because of bad practice of its users so should know the basic things on how you will get protected either what OS you are using.

There are several factors the reason hackers are less target LINUX because it's open source (correct me if I'm wrong with this thought) which means that its code is publicly available and can be reviewed by anyone.  This makes it easier for security experts to identify and patch vulnerabilities.

Here are my reasons, IMO.

• Linux has a smaller market share than Windows, meaning there are fewer potential targets for hackers.
• Linux is an open-source operating system

Many Bitcoin users prefer to use Linux for its security features and because it allows for greater control over the system.
So yes, I tend to agree with the comments above about Linux for better security and less malware.

Unfortunately, Windows is an operating system which, although stable and widespread, is often targeted by hacker attacks while Linux is much less so.  I think someone here has already suggested to use Tails and in fact it's a great operating system that doesn't need to be installed.

A good Linux distro is better than Windows for pretty much everything, not just running bitcoin.

The points made above (open source, better security, less malware) are the main ones. But let's not forget that Window is literal spyware. One study found that as soon as you turn Windows on for the first time, with absolutely no permissions being granted and no activity on your part at all, it already starts talking not just to Microsoft and Bing but to a whole host of random third parties and data analytics companies, sending all sorts of telemetry and even location data. If you use a bitcoin wallet on a Windows machine, then literally dozens of unknown third parties know you are doing it, and you have absolutely no idea what they are doing with that data.

Additionally, Linux is far more lightweight compared to Windows, and doesn't eat resources like Windows does. It is faster and more efficient. It actually does what you want it do, rather than Windows dictating how you are allowed to use it. It doesn't hit you with random restarts for updates you didn't even ask for or approve in the first place.

Expert prefer Linux because it is open source.

It is better you use cold wallet instead of online wallet, use online wallet for the amount of coins that you can afford to lose. I will prefer Linux because it is open source, windows is close source.

I have seen this in many places before and I do not doubt it again that Linux is most hacked among computer operating system.

This is another example which is true:


But Linux OS is open source and there is no computer OS that can not be hacked, if you know the simple way to avoid hack, you are 100% fine. No computer OS is even safe among them all if you want to have bigger amount, get a cold wallet or hardware wallet.

Security?

As tranthidung already said, maybe because most people use windows and most hacking tools are made for windows. Linux OS is targeted less by hackers. Still, you have to be careful. I don't use Linux yet because I don't know if I will be able to use all the software on a different OS that I am currently using. I can easily find free software for my Windows platform.

Surely There must be similar software for the Linux platform as well. But, I have to learn new things. Because of this fear, I never tried Linux OS. But, hacking, phishing increasing day by day. You have to be careful before you click on anything. I don't know if I will move to Linux or not. Maybe I have to.

You can continue to use Windows OS to interact with Bitcoin wallet and that's your choice, but if you're concerned about security, it's better to stay with Linux OS. You can't neglect the security of your assets if it is dear to you.

Friends don't give bad advice. Moreover, as you say, they all switched to Linux OS themselves. This is an occasion to think, maybe you should use their example.

If you enjoy using Windows OS, then keep doing it. No one is forcing you to completely change to Linux OS. You just need to use Linux OS to work with Electrum. This can be done on a separate PC or a separate drive. It is also possible to install Linux on a flash drive. There is a ready-made solution Tails OS, which tranthidung suggested above. A bunch of Tails OS on a flash drive + hardware wallet = you get security and keep your old habits with Windows.

Linux OS is less targeted by hackers and you will have less risk to be hacked. Hackers know that Windows is a most famous operation system and they spend most of their time to build malicious things on Windows.

Using Linux OS for your device, you are reducing such risks.

Linux Mint: https://linuxmint.com/

You can also use Tail OS too.
How to Install Tails OS on USB flash drive for Wallet Purpose

Can someone tell me the most important part why Linux OS is better to run Bitcoin wallet than Windows OS?

This days few of my friends are very concerned about the security of their Bitcoin wallet on windows OS and they decide to go Linux, they told me about this and before I knew how serious this was, almost all my friends are now installing Linux OS.

As for me, there are many reasons why I stick with windows, I love doing many things on winOS and those things aren't available on Linux but I am just curious to know, what's so great about running Electrum BTC wallet for example on a Linus OS?