Topic: Seedphrase security - Pros and Cons of offline storage - page 2. (Read 366 times)

The amount of bitcoin you are holding should determine the level of security you should be worrying about, like me I don't get much disturb over my seedphrase as I do have about 2 flash drive where I print it as pdf and get them stored inside. Also stored them in my system and including my phone, that is, it could be very hard for me to misplaced them or someone got them touched hence, putting myself into pressure is something I wouldn't do because I don't have upto 1 btc or even thousand of it to get myself so much worried about security.
Like a user suggested above, to create about several mails to send them in parts whereby no one knows about it even though they succeeded having access to one mail the rest will be untouchable meaning your security is strong. Note if you forgot the passwords of those mails then your funds is losts especially the main mail you used in sending out to the rest mails.

One simple solution is to split your seed phrase in two. Put one half in a safe bank vault and the other in a quiet corner of your second house where no one lives.

Most often, people are too paranoid and expect troubles that will never happen to them. But for your own peace of mind, it is better, of course, to come up with a way to store the seed phrase from which you can sleep peacefully. If you trust the storage of the seed phrase on a flash drive, make it more difficult to store. Make a hidden volume using programs like Vera Crypt, and place the document with the seed phrase on this volume. If a flash drive accidentally falls into the hands of a hacker or just a random person, no one will be able to decrypt it until they know the main password. In addition, when opening a flash drive, a person will not even realize that something may be hidden on this drive.

Trying to rely on anything digital to store your seeds will increase the possibility of losing them, even if this thing is encrypted or open source. Therefore, the more you use cold storage, the less likely you are to lose your money.
If you travel a lot, it is better for you to use a hardware wallet or extend the seeds with an additional phrase. You can save this phrase in a safe place so that if you lose your seeds (leave a small amount in the main account) you will be able to access all of your holdings using the additional phrase. You can save this phrase in a safe vault or In a different place.

If you can't trust yourself to remember the seed phrase, how can you be sure you'll remember or store your 3 passwords well? You can't guarantee that you'll keep one seedphrase well, you can't do better when you have to keep three passphrases. Your idea is not new, many people have proposed it and discussed it a lot, but in reality it is much more complicated and risky. I still prefer to use offline methods to store my seed phrases, they are safer when they are always with me rather than having to trust online and 3rd parties.

I'm not a fan of digital storage of anything secret, such as using a password manager. A hard copy is the best solution and if you want encryption, then you can still store the physical copy of the encrypted seed phrase.
Besides, the only case when a thief that enters your home is going to steal your seed phrase is if they are specifically targeting you for your bitcoins which means you shouldn't let anybody know you are storing your coins this way! Otherwise thieves are always looking for valuable things they "understand" like jewelry, cash, your TV, etc. They don't really know the value of some words on a piece of paper or better yet if it were written on a page inside a book in your bookshelf.

I think you are making it way complicated. I am already having 3-4 different wallets that includes one hardware wallet and other paper based wallet plus (going to change soon) mycelium wallet. I have properly stored the seed phrases by writing them down on paper in the perfect sequence I received. I have made one digital copy as well and have stored them in password protected drive. I don’t think you need any further security for your seed. If you are going to be “too” careful about it then you will definitely end up making mistakes and then my friend that’s gonna be Issue someday. Just keep it simple and traditional. Let us not try to make a big deal on how to store them safely.

Just Store it in similar ways you save your gmail password or password for gf or bf Instagram account. 

Any storage method whether offline or online will have pros and cons and nothing is 100% secure. Your method may be a good way to deal with hackers but it is also risky, if you forget your password or cannot access one of your many password managers, you will not be able to access your bitcoins. Your method will make things more complicated because you'll need to remember more passwords as well as find a place to store passwords for your password managers. I really don't like this idea.

Don't be too paranoid, Virtually almost all you have listed above is applicable to your body which is the most precious part of your life but you are just keep living.

Regarding SEED phrase. I see the most of your concern is what to do with it while  traveling.

There are a lot tricks that can help you.

Just a few examples.

You may fix SEED words in the  carry-on book. Don't forget to burn that book after end of your trip.

You may put your SEED inside indigestible capsule and swallow it. Don't forget to examine your dung  to find that capsule.

After all, you may memorize you SEED phrase and mutter  it under the  breath while travelling.

All is in your hands, just string-up imagination.

Cheese.

Don't do this. It provides zero redundancy and greatly increases your risk of loss, not to mention still creates a single point of failure on creation and restoration of said seed phrase.

If you want to require access to multiple back ups in order to recover your wallet, then use multi-sig. Multi-sig effectively solves all five of OP's concerns. If you lose or throw away one back up, you can recover from the others. If a natural disaster destroys one back up, you can recover from the others. If someone steals one back up, not only can they not access your coins, but you can recover from the others. Need even more redundancy than that? Use 3-of-5 instead of 2-of-3.

Pros & Cons

-Hackers can't steal your seedphrase if it's not online.But thieves can
-Offline storage methods like metal plates and paper wallets can withstand a lot of wear and tear.Secure But like fire & other things gone a damage it
-You're the only one with access to your seedphrase.If another person find it , You lose

Do this

-Make multiple copies of your seedphrase and store them in different locations. (Or sites , notes , encrypted sites.)
-Use a durable storage medium, such as a metal plate or paper wallet.
-Choose a storage location that is safe from fire, water, and theft.
-Do not share your seedphrase with anyone.expect friends

I don't know about best  solution because we have all read stories of people losing these wallets and trying to get them back to the point of suing garbage collection companies and it's never a pretty scene.
AFAIK, best to go with what works for you especially that we live in different environments, different house setups and ease of others having access to personal space is something to factor in.
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I love the idea of breaking the seedphrase in several parts as this can be applied to both password managers and paper wallets , but in the hands of a crypto minded person if these 3 or 2 parts are  obtained then it's over for our coins.
Otherwise all these solutions have their own strengths and weakness.

All the points you mentioned can be avoided by making enough copies, storing them in a safety box or other place that will be difficult for anyone, including your partner or children to access.
In my opinion, the more afraid you are of losing it and trying things that look complicated, the more troublesome it will be later when something unexpected happens.

Trusting banks or centralized party is a mistake.

Theoretically the banks can reverse the money, but the reality they will not always refund it because they will asking more and more evidence to make you don't have any way to proof it.

Why you can assume the robbery would do that on the street? criminality can happen in a house and I've pointed out above. People will choose to give everything they have rather than die.

Doesn't matter, the robbery will force you to give them the seed phrase.

You can report your credit card lost or stolen and you will not be responsible for the unauthorized charges, and you don't lose a penny.
You can't do that with bitcoin or crypto. Once your bitcoin is lost it is lost forever and you cannot call someone at the bank to help you.

If someone robs you of your fiat money on the street you might lose a couple hundred dollars or something, not a big deal to lose such a small amount because
that's how much people carry around at most. Most people don't walk around with thousands or millions of dollars in cash they keep most of their money in a bank.

But a seedphrase could have someone's life savings stored in it, even millions of dollars worth of digital assets.
It is much easier for someone to steal a seedphrase than for them to break into your bank and steal all your money.

I'm off using these applications that are suggesting or keeping our passwords, it's not just right for me although they look helpful for someone who doesn't know about keeping passwords.

Anything that's related to finances, crypto and money, I wouldn't use these apps that are gonna keep my passwords, etcs.

They seem to be suggesting strong passwords but you'll never know if they keep backlogs of their users and then you'll just find it out that you've been lost and gone with as you've been used by them.

Here we go, someone who always trying to see a bad thing even it's really small and forget about every good thing.

#1 and #2, what's the difference with robbery who point your head with his gun and ask the password of your credit card/debit card or every assets you have? regardless you hold fiat, gold etc aren't nothing different.

#3 and #5, that's your fault, it's easy to prevent by back up your seed phrase more than one with different medias/tools.

#4, teach them and they will not do that.

Same thing as keeping online, the online storage is even worse because it is exposed to almost every hacker on the internet.


If a thief actually breaks into your house and requests for your seed phrase then that is no ordinary thief but rather someone close to you that you might have discuss your holdings with so the best will be to stay on a private about your holdings. And if the thief actually just sees Randomly then it was your lack of proper storage that caused it.


This can be solved by having a one or two more back up but most importantly it will be hard if you actually have significant amount on that wallet because you will regularly remember and check that place.

Why throw your seed around just anyplace in your house, it should be where your precious documents are.

Solve this by using metal washers instead of paper and try to increase your backup to areas which faces less disaster if your place is not that secure


You don’t need to store them on a password manager just like you said it is bad but the best thing would be to use add a passphrase that you can remember and even the thief gets access to the seed phrase they would still need a passphrase who will be know to only you.

Splitting the keys in halves doesn’t help the thief and also you too, because should you lose the other half then it poses risk to the Wallet. Also with half the seed the thief could use a btc recovery tool



You don’t need to carry it about when traveling just back it up properly at one place and the added passphrase should be with you that will save it.

Do not trust yourself to cram the seed phrase off heart, health conditions can change and will cause the lost of it

4) you can hide your seed via emails . you send 24 emails to three emails.

each email has some seeds in it

5) my suggestion above in 4 prevents this.

At least, but important, you control it until a day you lost the control. It's better than storing it online by that you don't have any control and rely on many third parties to control security of your account, information inside it including your backup.

Is it seriously?

Backups are strong tools to help you avoid those situations and when you make backup, you should have some backups, not only one.

If you store your backups at locations where easily to be seen, your methodology is not good at beginning.

Good backup methodology can help you. Multiple backups, multiple locations.
How to backup a seed phrase