Topic: Electrum to Electrum - transaction "lost" - page 2. (Read 582 times)

Did you also verify the digital signature of the binaries that you downloaded against this public key[1] before installing it? Keep in mind that it is not enough to have downloaded it from "correct" website, you must verify the signature against the correct public key. Without it you can NOT trust the authenticity of what you have.

[1] https://raw.githubusercontent.com/spesmilo/electrum/master/pubkeys/ThomasV.asc

@HCP

Look, I don't quite remember now. I have this believe.....
Yes, might be, I did try to create & restore few wallets (for the purpose of finding solution) but if, then only after I sent the test transaction to the lost wallet


Here is another thing as mantioned already few times:

• I sent first a test transaction to my "lost" wallet        and      remember seeing that incoming transaction onto my lost wallet - that is certain!                Because.....
  
  I remember seeing this transaction as   'Not Veriefied'   all the time (until I lost the wallet)      
  So, I did the transaction and I saw it showing off in my wallet, even though as   'Not Verified', thus I understood it went through and eventually it will confirm.      
  
  That was the reason  I sent  the funds to the 2nd address in the wallet  because for me it was clear it went through & eventually will be confirmed.
  
  • Following, many hours have past  and nothing was confirmed, still as 'Not Veriefied",  even though I put the mining fee for confirmation within 5 blocks  (for big transaction within 2)
    
    That is how I started looking for the solution:          deleted the wallet files, recovered again, deleted again, restored again  & so on.
    
    
    
    
    Quote from: HCP on June 23, 2021, 10:29:23 PM
    Or am I misunderstanding and you're saying you restored the wallet once (prior to updating etc) and it showed the "lost" address, but not the transaction data?
    
    I idid restore the wallet twice.  Did see the same addresses  but didn't see the transactions as confirmed
    
    That is why I had to delete the wallet anew (based on guide line on Tails website)  & search for futher solution, where I came across the suggestion on Electrum website - to update the Electrum software manually -  & so I did.
    
    Since then I have never been able to restore the "lost" wallet with the funds.

I'd say you should focus on getting the right derivation path first, then wallet file recovery as a last resort.

What was the electrum version bundled with Tails before you updated to version 3.3.8? Since you mentioned that the seed restores the wallet fine on the old version, but it restores to a different wallet on this newer version, it is possible that Electrum has changed the default derivation path or otherwise the algorithm it uses to derive the private keys, hence why knowing the old electrum version (or at least the Tails version you used and we use package manager repositories to pinpoint the Electrum version ourselves) is so important, as it will allow us to scan for code changes on Github related to key derivation.

Edit:

Do you at least know which version of Tails you used at the time?

Regardless of the answer, by looking at this: electrum/issues/5082 (the corruption bug) and the replies, there's a chance that it could be the case.
If it's really what happened and you've sent the bitcoins to the corrupted wallet file, then the partial solution to this is to restore that wallet file using a file recovery software.
And that would be a problem depending on where you've installed Tails and if it's been active since the incident.

But the real problem is if that recovered wallet can spend from that address, because based from the "issue", the corruption will produce different addresses that aren't covered by your master public key.
Means that your seed can't derive the right private key(s) to spend from them.

- You can try to recover all available possible wallet files in "wallets" folder and get all of the wallets' seed phrase, then use your 'E_Wind' to restore each of them.

---

One scenario that the corruption bug might happen is when you created the wallet while the "default_wallet" is still active.
Newbies usually create a wallet during Electrum's first "Install Wizard" which is actually wallet creation window, prior to creating his official wallet.

Since the issue's going nowhere from all the "no", recovering every deleted/overwritten Electrum wallet files from Tails' persistent folder it's worth the try.

Note: in case of non-recoverable funds, Electrum developers aren't liable for the missing funds (damages), it's in the software's licence.

I don't think it would be the "file corruption bug"... as that would have required that you had (at least attempted to create) multiple wallets/seeds... and you seem very adamant that you did not have multiple seeds/wallets etc.

So, either you did have multiple wallets setup... in which case that makes things like using the wrong wallet possible, in addition to the "file corruption bug"... or you didn't have multiple wallets setup... in which case the file corruption bug is not possible.


The curious thing is that you're sure you had previously used the seed to restore the wallet (at least once)... and that you could see the transaction etc... but the wallet was always "offline"?

That isn't possible... if you had restored the wallet, it would have had to have been online at some point to be able to see the transaction... All wallets are created empty, and need to be online to retrieve the transaction data.

Or am I misunderstanding and you're saying you restored the wallet once (prior to updating etc) and it showed the "lost" address, but not the transaction data?

@HCP

- it is Legacy. I have alwaysed used & recovered in Legacy
- Absolutely certain:   I did not modify derivation path
- Absolutely certain:   I did not extend the seed with custom words




1. Absolutely NOT.    I have used that wallet generated with that seed. -  Besides that I have mentioned that I did recover the "lost" wallet before I did the update on Electrum software.
2. NO.
3. NO.
4. NO.
5. Well....  in my previous topic in Spt. 2019 I wrote that the wallet was affected by a    'file corruption bug'.
Why did I write it? Because I found this information either on Tails,- or Electrum website, thus at that point it seemed to me that was it, due to descriptions on the website.       That might well be the whole problem.




Now this..... this is something Great!   &     I've been jerking on it for over half of the day
                                                                                                                                               ..... didn't go nowhere, until now at least
Here is the thing:  
>>>> look at the picture @bitmover hosted, with 2 wallets
The wallet from the left side  -  find straight away, without any problems or changing anything in the tool.
The wallet from the right side  -  I am incapable of digging it out.  Tried each Master Node, many different accounts, wallet chains & addresses   -   I can not find it.    

Any tip on that?

Keep in Mind the both wallets were generated using the same seed.




I guess too.

I have somehow this feeling that it has something to do with my problem  &  might be also  file corruption bug (mentioned in topic in Spt. 2019)
[/quote]

Might have happened, don't recall now.  I don't have that feeling though.

But let's just assume I did it.   I am absolutely certain - if I did it - I did not change any derivation path.  
Thereupon once you check the BIP39 box, it comes always automatically the following derivation path:     m/44/0'/0'
And yes, I do have some used addresses on this derivation path. You can see it on the picture above.
Wallet with the 6 transactions, on the right side, is with that derivation path.

No if all you are saying is right, it can't have anything to do with the issue unfortunately. UTF-8/Unicode compatibility disorders are pretty frequent between different operating systems and/or computers, but it's a very rare mistake/error on a same OS on a same machine.

Hello

Absolutely, mentioned few times now.
Yes, I did recover my "lost" wallet on Tails twice, before upgrading the Electrum software.


No, I have created that wallet on Tails.       

I did create also one on Windows but never had any problems with.     Problems only with Tails Electrum wallet

Everything is cool!

I value your help!
Thank you for your contribution!



......yes,    but no.    There is still missing something......     Can be improved


 @everybody      We are on the good way, just keep on thinking & suggesting.

Thank you

@pooya87

No, not even a tiny chance!     Absolutely out of question!    Because I did restore that "lost" wallet before the update with the same seed!

That is exactly what it is! - at least I think so too.
Now, how to find that wallet - that is what I'm trying to find out from the community here!


.....the longest & most diversified I've ever experienced 


No, not at all.  This are different addresses, entirely

Hello AndrRoos
Thank you for your PM.

Could you clarify something please?
Do you remember if you have been able to recover your wallet on Tails at least one time before upgrading the Electrum software?

Because as I understand, you've created your wallet and its seed on MS Windows first.
But Electrum is using UTF-8 character encoding, so maybe the (UTF-8) character set that has been used to create your seed on MS Windows is not the same as the one used on Tails?

https://electrum.readthedocs.io/en/latest/seedphrase.html

Alright fair enough. I wasn't very happy after spending quite some time reading through both threads to figure out what's going on and got chided like that. I was just trying to clarify on the scenario that you've presented. Your second response explained everything that I needed to know, didn't respond afterwards seeing the reply and edited my post instead to avoid padding the thread up unnecessarily. Nonetheless, apologies if I was harsh on my words.

HCP's response basically encompasses the gist of the entire thread.

@ranochigo

You are absolutely right!

There is no point of being frustrated or being pissed off and I am cool. Often time I am polictical incorrect & say as it is. That is World difference between being pissed off & political incorrectness.  Is just that I am aware, that some poeple write the first thing that pops in the head without digging in deeper.


I appreciate every single help & contribution from every one! 
I am willing to answer every single qustion!


Thank you

Firstly, your assumption is wrong. Whether you generate the seed online or offline makes exactly zero difference to how the seed is generated... and unless the version of Electrum that you used in Tails was very very very old (ie. pre version 2), then chances are that the version you used will have made no difference either.

Assuming the same seed words are used, then the differences between wallets are caused by the selections that are made when generating the wallet... that is to say:
- Selecting "Legacy" or "Segwit"
- Modifying the deriviation path
- "extending the seed with custom words"

Electrum has a "Seed version" system, which should prevent issues with #1... as it will automatically detect if the seed is "Legacy" or "Seed". It will also default to a specific derivation path based on that "seed version". However, this does not stop you from manually changing the derivation path (whether it is done on purpose or by accident)... Note that it's not exactly "difficult" to accidentally change the derivation path.

Also, if the seed is extended with custom words, there is zero indication that this is the case... you cannot tell if a wallet was created from an extended seed. It's much more difficult to do this "accidentally" as you have to click through the "options" button, tick the "Extend seed" checkbox and then put in the custom words in a later dialog box.


Now... I would say that one of the following are the likely causes for this whole scenario (in order of probability):

1. Accidentally using a secondary/different wallet that wasn't created using the seed you wrote down
2. Accidental modification of derivation path during initial wallet creation
3. Seeds mixed up during wallet creation
4. "forgotten" Seed Extension
5. Some hitherto unknown bug in Electrum

Unfortunately, pretty much all of these scenarios end up in the same place... ie. it's going to be incredibly difficult to recover. Especially given that all the original files on Tails were deleted

It is now pretty much impossible to check for #1... it's effectively just speculation at this point, but I've seen it happen before. A user creates multiple wallets, saves the seed for one, and then accidentally uses a receiving address from one of the others.


If you want to experiment with #2, the derivation path theory, then I would recommend downloading and running this tool offline: https://github.com/FarCanary/ElectrumSeedTester

It's basically a modified version of IanColeman's BIP39 tool that works with Electrum seeds. It also allows you to put in "custom seed extensions" (ie. a BIP39 passphrase but for Electrum seeds).

#3 seems quite unlikely, it's sort of a variation of #1 but it's a difficult thing to do given that you have to re-enter the seed to actually create the wallet. #4 also doesn't seem likely given that it requires a number of very explicit steps on behalf of the user, which you are sure that you didn't do... and as for #5, that's almost impossible to prove/disprove unless someone finds something reproducible and the devs can investigate/identify the issue.


I guess at this point, the derivation path is your best hope, so give the modified seed tool a go... but I would caution that you don't raise your hopes too high... the chances of this being the cause of all this are probably slim to none

Best of luck.

I think there is a good chance here that you actually created a brand new wallet with its own seed phrase while you were trying to import the same old seed. It is an easy mistake to make if you forget to change the first option to not generate a new seed phrase. That would explain why after "recovering" a new wallet you get a different address without changing anything else about derivation path, etc.

Those are the expected behavior of Electrum in those scenarios.

My observations/replies, in respective order:
-

• Electrum seed doesn't have a specific cold/hot wallet variant, just a seed with "seed version" that also acts as the indicator of the derivation path to use.
  Hardware wallet's seed wont be created by nor stored in Electrum during wallet creation.
  So if it was created by Electrum, then it's what Abdussamad said (multiple times) in the previous thread: you shouldn't force the derivation path selection window by checking "BIP39 seed".
  If it's the mentioned "corruption bug", then there's nothing you can do about it because if the cause is 'corruption' then the result should be 'random'.

-

• If you ticked "BIP39 seed" and it said "BIP39 (checksum: failed)", Electrum will create a wallet based on the words you've typed regardless if it's a valid BIP39 seed or not,
  that includes the Electrum seed that isn't a valid BIP39 seed.
  So the BIP39 restored wallet doesn't have a relation on the correctly restored one (didn't checked BIP39 seed), they are different wallets despite having same seed phrase.
  That said, why's both wallets have transaction(s) in them, have you been testing the wallets created through "other methods"?
  If not, you might had more than one wallets in your old E_Tails and sent the missing transaction to one of them (already mentioned before).

-

• Lastly, Electrum doesn't really store the seed phrase of a wallet created with "BIP39 seed" checkbox enabled, even the ones created using a real BIP39 seed.

That was a very long 48hours.

So, are addresses of the restored wallets the same except for the missing one?
Refer to my last reply of in that thread:

@BlackHatCoiner

thank you for this answer!

Yeah, I am quite certain that it is not understadable enough.


Messed up with Electrum?   -  what would I mess up? 
1. I've just typed in the seed that was generated   &    recovered that "lost" wallet.  Since there was still no conncetion to the servers...
2. I've updated the Electrum manager/user on Tails to newer version     and then.....
3. Typed in the same seed again    &      guess what     -       I get entirely new wallet with entirely new addresses  -  even though using the same seed!
4. And ever since I get this wallet & never the 1st one with the funds

That's all, that's the whole story.  -  Didn't do any BIP39, any phrase extension, any derivation path,  nor any other thing!
Just typed in the seed that I had in first place.  -   That's all.


Now, I assume - it has something to do with me generating the seed                  offline & on older version           meaning it became kind of a cold wallet.   Then deleted all the files, because it was recomended so on Tails website. 
   Then on Electrum website I found that it is necessary to update the wallet manually  & so I did it & from that moment onwards it worked just fine!   The Electum manager went online (once you are in the wallet)       But......
Since I have deleted all the files from that "cold" wallet,  used the exact same seed,   as a result I'm getting a brand new wallet with brand new addresses    &   the one from before,,,, have never seen again.
    That's all.   

Now @anyone  could help me here ahead


@BlackHatCoiner but thank you for that tip with source code.   Can you downoad it on GitHub?   I'm gonna check it out.

Well, from my reading, I say that it's not understandable enough. You've confused the whole situation with the given explanations. You can't have messed it up with Electrum, it's easy to use and I believe that even a newbie understands every part of the seed generation procedure. You probably made a mistake unrelated with Electrum you haven't mentioned, because you may not know it.

You can actually import an electrum seed phrase in iancoleman as long as you want legacy addresses.