Topic: can someone help me ? (Read 190 times)

Sure, I'll help you

I personally use NORTON but you can use anyone, as today they are very good even in the free version.

My advice is to use your coins offline and not in the same PC you use to do your stuff.

But personally i suggest you AVG as anti-virus.

But the best Anti-Virus remain YOU ! i suggest you to check for news about new security vulnerabilities, a good source for that: https://thehackernews.com
And of course BitcoinTalk to check for new vulnerabilities about tools related to cryptocurrencies.

And do not install random softwares .

What about customs. A chief cunstable decides they want to find packets with bitcoin hardware wallets in it and replace them with ones similar in order to make a quick amount of money. What about ledger themselves, they could throw in a few issues with their wallet to steal funds (do it to about 0.1% of packages and it won't rise up very mcuh suspicion).

My online computer didn't get hacked either. So both are as unlikely to happen, it's safer to airgap a client though and easier than to get a hardware wallet.


Well that's an obvious truth. A laptop looks like a harmless and innocent device that could have been used for anything. A ledger nano is quite clearly a bitcoin wallet and it's a bit easier to steal than a computer. Slip it into their pocket and away they go. The maid stuff could be a hobby waiting for a wealthy bitcoin investor to drop their ledger drive in their room somewhere or they could be trafficked into that country to work as a maid and are trying to get their freedome (stealing $100 is probably fine in that circumstance but not a drive with $20000+ on it).

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Meanwhile the topic in question is on antivirus and not how likeley a maid is to steal your hardware wallet.
You also have to write your seed down with a hardware wallet which is, in itself, a way the money could be taken.

You prefer to use an desktop wallet on an online device because you are afraid that some hacker would have access to postal service?
You are deciding about your safety based on your personal feelings, not rationally.

Your postal service attacker would need to:
- steal your hardwallet from the postal service
- install a malware on the device
- give it back to the postal service without being noticed
- then the postal service would have to deliver the hardwallet to you.
- you need to install and use the hardware wallet BEFORE updating the firmware.

You are saying that this attack is more probable to happen then your daily online desktop gets infected?

This is why I said this kind of discussion is useless. Because its not based on rational arguments, but feelings.

I saw other thread about this already, where a guy said that using a bitcoin core client on a daily computer was safer then using ledger nano, because ledger nano was vulnerable to the "evil maid attack".
Well, a desktop wallet and even an airgapped pc is vulnerable to this "evil super hacker cryptographer maid attack".
I just don´t get why someone so intelligent and with all that knowledge is working as a maid cleaning bathrooms, trying to find a hardwallet , when he could easily be making millions of dollars working on a cybersecurity company

Is that denial that hardware wallets are somehow now really safe. A lot of attacks have taken place in the past on them

They are insured though in quite a few countries.
And yes it is best to use webcams as bob said but then you have to get two webcams that you use for only that and sometimes qr code scanner apps get a bit faulty (there's also the 1000 byte limit of QR codes).

This is also reliant on your postal carriers and security officicals not changing anything on it's way to you.

You'd still then need an antivirus. I managed to store 1.25BTC when the price per bitcoin was $16000 without any issues in electrum on an online computer.

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And the two webcams idea seems good, but there is a 1000 byte limit to a lot of qr code scanners. Another idea of doing this would be using DVDs that you can just throw away afterwards as they're really cheap.

I am speaking quite seriously. Thinking is enough. A paid antivirus may not help. And it's best to avoid Windows. It always gives him a chance, but it always turns out to be a bad thing.

Do you ask about an antivirus? Frankly speaking. It is better to simply isolate important things from each other.

I think when the discussion reaches this point where people claim "hardware wallets are not safe" we are just going in circles.

You are safe enough with a hardwallet.
Using an airgapped pc may be better if you know what you are doing and you are very careful. No one could insert a pen drive or connect it to the internet (wifi or ethernet). There are many other things that you must be aware, careful and paranoid to have something close to 99% security even using an air gapped pc.

Even using a bank account and visa you can lose money, as they are not 100%.

As far as I know ledger nano vulnerabilities happen when the attacker gets physical access to your device.
If you bought from third party seller, you must consider it as a permanently compromised device. So always buy from the official retailer.

I can say that ESET Smart Security is one of the best security suites out there, it is a bit expensive but really worth the money. There is no "the best" antivirus as it all comes down to personal preferences so do some research and make your conclusion yourself.

Reading a lot of reviews in google I am sure will help you decide without being affected from any of our opinions here.

Thats definitely true. I never intended to claim they are entirely safe. 100% safety and security does not exist.
I just wanted to point out that using the 'best AV software' is not enough to keep funds safe, since OP seems to be wanting to secure his holdings.




This is definitely a thinkable (but also less-probable) way of compromising an 'air-gapped' wallet.
But the question is also whether you would consider such a system as truly air gapped. Replace the flash drives to transmit transactions with 2 webcams and you have one less attack vector.

I am not saying this would be a perfect solution. It may still be possible to compromise this system with a buffer overflow in the screen capturing software (using the TX QR's to transmit data).
The chance of getting compromised does always exist.. it just gets really really small. It is about how low the probability has to be until you can sleep good at night 

If you can't afford an hardware wallet you should obtain a virus protection and a malware protection.
for antivirus I suggest you BitDefender, for antimalware MalwareBytes

These two aren't entirely safe though. Don't rely on them for being able to do whatever you want to on the internet. There are stuff in trezor software especially that come up where there are vulnerabilities found inn old vertions of the software. Ledger, I think is a bit more secure, but you can never get total security. Airgapping also means viruses can be transmitted through flash drives which can end up grabbing your code.

Even things like paper wallets can never be truly secure (a dice throw and a script running offline can fix some of these errors however, these are much more secure if your plan is to hodl instead of spend).

This is important.


You can have the best AV software and the 'best' habits using the web.. but (properly) self-coded malware will never be detected by AV software.
And even if your system is always up-to-date (what you should definitely be looking for!), new vulnerabilities are discovered on a daily basis.
Especially javascript/flash/pdf's are a pretty big security concern.

You can never be completely safe on an system which is connected to the internet. For a real secured storage for your coins, choose a hardware wallet or an air-gapped storing solution.

Personally I use malware bytes and windows defender. Keep them updated.

The most important if you use a desktop wallet are your habits.
Do you watch porn on the web?
Do you download piracy products on shady websites?
Do you use shady cracks to piracy programs?

All those things are important. You need to be at least a bit smart to never click a phishing site, never click on suspicious links.
Never go after free money, which are probably scams to infect your computer.

If you ever download something suspicious, use https://www.virustotal.com/ to scan the file before opening it.

Anyway , the most secure and easier solution is buy a hardwallet, such as ledger nano.

Most paid for antiviruses do well. My preference is Norton by Symantec.

However, a lot of other users use McAfee, Avast and AVG.

I don't think there is a better one it's just down to your own preference, they all probably share databases anyway (or have access to each others' databases).

For free ones, I'd probably say malwarebytes is the most reliable.

If you get an antivirus, make it so it won't scan your blockchain folder (as it might corrupt it).

 What virus scanning software best ?
I want to protect my computer, I store coin on it and do not want to be stolen.