Topic: Try to evaluate your way of securing your bitcoin. (Read 699 times)

it is quite sad to see how the assets that you have worked so hard to hold but in the end cannot be accessed just because you mistakenly thought that when you wrote down the private key on paper and kept it at your home it was the safest. however, writing down the private key on a stainless steel plate is one of the best ways to secure the private key from such things, because stainless is durable, rustproof, fireproof, and various other advantages. a person can use this stainless plate to write down their private key and secure it at their home or other place.

Multiple iron plates with your private keys are more like it, if we go for the options that would involve risks like that.
They are rare, but they are still there.

This incident makes me want to take disaster proofing my crypto seriously. Aside from physical backups, I think it's worth looking into hardware wallets with passphrase protection. That would give me peace of mind knowing my investments are safe even if my home isn't.

Wow, that's a shame, not only did they lose their whole property and personal items, but also their coins. This goes a long way to show us that there's no fool-proof solution in securing our wallets. To be honest, it doesn't cross your mind that your house will be set on fire during a wildfire and you'll lose your hardware wallet or your stored seed phrase. This is an important point to reconsider the safety of our coins and think of alternative ways to backup our money.

All options have both benefits and drawbacks, a combination of several methods is perhaps the safest option. Unfortunately, our phones and our computer devices have vulnerabilities that render them a risk.

I find this story very strange, because I think that she could have stored part of the phrase in a cell of one bank, and part of the phrase in a cell of another bank. Thus ensuring the complete safety of funds. Well, I understand that maintaining cells in a bank costs a lot of money, but it really makes sense. And if such a grandmother did not have much in the account, then I think it makes no sense to grieve over the lost funds in Cryptocurrency, because it is not comparable with the house

Do you mean that you store your seed phrase in a metal safe? Physical storage of the private key certainly saves your Bitcoins from attack by hackers (who operate in virtual space). The safe will be difficult for an unprofessional burglar to crack.

However, a professional burglar will certainly cope with this task. A physical safe also has one serious drawback - it itself, by its existence, indicates that you have valuables that may be of interest to a thief.

Also, a metal safe can melt in a fire, or it can end up deep under the rubble of a house, from where it will be very difficult to get it.

Nevertheless, this method of storing the seed phrase deserves attention. But in any case, when creating your own system for storing the seed phrase, in my opinion, it is better to use diversification.

Would laminated paper withstand fire or things like it?
That would be the answer to what to choose, however, it's only as to make the biggest precautions of what can happen to the info you want to store in any situation.

there are plenty ways to store valuable information written down like for example it can be carved into a stone or whatever kind of metal so that it does not fade or anything like that when stored for a very long time

there are also good quality paper that you can laminate so that the writing of the pen or any printed ink does not fade and that the paper if got wet by some water won't turn soft and rip

Would you get only one or multiple pieces to store them somewhere?

It's painful reminder that we need a contingency plan for everything including our digital assets. Personally, I'll explore using a metal recovery plate for storing my private key since they're more resistant to fire or water damage. I wouldn't want to be caught unprepared.

If you document your seed phrase on paper, the only thing that can make you to lost your bitcoin after you have or saved your private key manually is fire outbreak, but in norms its good to have your private stored or saved manually instead of email kind of storage

I know that people don't know how to keep document manually except that they're informed on how to store document manually, see all my important documents is been stored in a iron cage, you called it a box, but it's in iron form, for more hundred years whatever I kept in that box will be intact without destruction, because it's only me that know how important those document is to me,

So in this scenario I would not advice anyone to save he or her seed phrase through email, it can be easily be hacked by people, most when you lost your device, house documentation is the best.

Although it is indeed a good thing because we will be more careful and more alert to protect assets and their scope such as seeds or phrases because calling it is important but worrying too much about things that are not certain is also not very good so in the end in this case we will actually become paranoid ourselves because of something that is not even certain to happen.

Prudence is important but it does not mean that we should also feel too worried about situations that are only based on things that are not certain or even not happening to us because after all, a disaster like what happened some time ago cannot be predicted.

We do have to be more observant and more protective in protecting the assets we have so that we are more comfortable and do not feel haunted by anxiety that seems to be actually an excessive thing.

To make myself safe at such violent scenarios resulted from the natural calamity I have dispersed by SEED over the world sending  it to my relatives and close friends. My way of keeping SEED on digital media allowed me to do it and at the same time  not to be bothered about SEED security. Anyone can made the most from my way.

Paper is temporary.
Good metal is almost eternal.
 

I understand now how vital it is to diversify how and where we store important data. I'll consider splitting my private key into multiple parts, sorting them in different secure locations. That way even if one is lost, I'd still have access to my funds.

Those who are in need would learn things up and do things differently.
Those who are not - would be using custodials and or even ETFs.. which, in my opinion, is even a bit worse than buying actual Bitcoins.

This is why I secured my wallet on metal plate and not just store it in one place, also always having a backup for the hardware wallet also good. most of hardware provider always have a bundle for this, since there's high demand for backups. some even offer cloud backup which in my opinion isn't secure.

but tbh, I think since self custody is kinda difficult and need proper technical knowledge, sometime I think that some people are better off having their BTC in custodial service or just BTC ETF for this kind of thing.

When such happens the first thing I think of is creating an alternative, like the victim should be able to provide another environment that contains the private key. Even when considering an alternative people still intend to place this information in a different area and same building meanwhile If anything happens to the building like op example everything is gone, no one will love to experience any kind of bad situation as such even relatives. Well separating this information is valid and how sure is the substance carrying the details save meaning how long will this last for years is also important honestly the paper kind of work is the least due to the soft texture anything can happen.

Well, most people do not anticipate such unforeseen incidents like fire, earthquake, floods or another natural disasters when storing private keys. If we take these things into account, then for sure the paper backup needs to be backed up too in different places. Usually, people will store two backups of the paper in the same home, so if the house catches fire, both of the backups will likely be burnt.

Also, it is not easy to store it elsewhere, away from home, as then you have to trust someone else to safeguard your seed phrases. Due to this reason some people may store the keys online, which is even more wrong step.

People who live in areas that are affected by natural disasters should prepare. How about people who don’t expect or experience such incidents, like the one that happened in LA, which no one was expecting that tohappen? It’s just safer irrespective of where you live or base or what method you use to secure your bitcoin to make multiple backups so that if access to one is blocked or lost, the other will come in as plan B and C. Anything that has to do with money, we should always consider every possible option.

It is pitiful, grandma is probably too weak to run and find where she's placed her assets keys. This is a total disaster and we don't want this to happen to anyone.

To be honest, that's what everyone is feeling right now.

Being anxious of unexpected events that we'll never know that's coming. So being prepared is what we have to do and that's right with OP, we have to evaluate on how we keep our Bitcoins secured.

The passphrases or private keys, how we keep them relies on how wise we are. The suggestions are all over the place and we have to pick what will work best for us.

It's a disaster that can't be predicted beforehand but that doesn't mean we have to feel anxious about it because even though there is a possibility of unexpected events happening but we just hope that something like that never happens to us.

Talking about the security of seeds or phrases in the end it comes back to each of us personally.
Losing your phrasebook is a problem but eventually we'll realize that it's still the best way to go about securing our phrases.

When talking about backup it is optional because if you need it then do it but when you don't feel this is needed then it doesn't matter as long as they know the risks that will occur and even in some cases we also often see discussions about memorizing seeds or phrases. I personally still do that where I write at least a copy to keep in a safe place, even though some people think it might not be necessary but I still feel that it is important and this is just to make me more comfortable so that when my seed or phrase is lost or damaged then I still have a backup for it.

I have come across some thread on this forum that talked about ways to secure your wallet seed phrase in case of situations like  wildfire out break, earthquake, flood and any  natural disasters that could cause a big damage. This kind of situations are predicted to happen and people living in region with these kinds of natural disasters should always be prepared to keep their phrase safe against this kind of situations. 

This incident will profit so many investors who has made similar mistakes of storing there private key on a piece of paper without thinking of having a backup.when talking of backup it should just be one, we should always have this mindset, what if something happens to were am storing my private key how are my going to get it back. Life is full of unpredictable events so in whatever we are doing we should always be extremely careful to avoid unexpected stories. 

That's a huge lost for her I could imagine how she feels right now, this is why storing our seed phrase in a shirt of paper is not always advisable because sometimes water can even splash on it and the ink start fading away, even if she choose to store it in a shirt of paper but at least she's supposed  to have a backup, or maybe she never have the thought of backing it up in a different place.  maybe she has this strong feeling that nothing is going to happen, now this is it. Of course she never believed such thing will happen but the only blame she has is not having a backup because had it been she back it up in somewhere else she wouldn't have go through this mess.

I feel sad for the older lady, I saw the fire incident in the news, it was so traumatizing and heartbroken but the other crypto firm, what's exactly do they do as a firm because I'm not sure if they store their private keys on a piece of paper like the older woman and they stored it in a hardware wallet that got burnt? There is something not right about this news. Why not back up the seed phrase on the metallic surface that came with the wallet, the metal back up are atleast hard to some degrees that ordinary fire out break can't melt them.

If they store the coins on a piece of paper, such company doesn't deserve to be called firm, they are just garbage and if they lost coins to ledger and couldn't protect the ledger with huge amount of money, then they know nothing about management. If they didn't back up the wallet, I will advise anyone that has crypto with them to sue their ass. It's even possible they might be lying to the public. Just trying to see if they can run away with the Bitcoin.

I have been trying to know what causes the wildfire in LA and till now I have not gotten the information on the caused of the FIRE accident in LA. Fire accident is better than flood. In flood after the period of the flood, if it was not a natural one, you can come back to the house but fire would burn the house down and right now building materials are very much cost that one can't just build a house like that again.
As for the seed phrase, since she is at LA, she would have bought stainless steel to backup her seed phrase or better be still, she would have used more than one backup paper wallets for the seed phrase in different locations.

You can store your bitcoin and its backup in multiple formats and methods, physical like paper, metal sheet, or digital like USB stick, hard drive, hardware wallets, whatever.

The important reminder is you must do it with multiple methods and backups, to make sure if an accident occurs, you won't lose all your wallet files and backups at the same time. It means if you are alive, you will be able to access or recover your wallet, and access your bitcoin.

If it is digital storage, it must be encrypted as much as possible.

How to backup a seed phrase?

Ouch, that is very unfortunate news. I know we're supposed to store our seeds on paper, but for various reasons I don't do that and store it digitally, despite the risks. For one, I'm concerned that a piece of paper is something I might accidentally throw away, forget where I put it, or it might be found by someone else (say, a guest visiting my home) and draw unnecessary attention. Moreover, I like in a country that is currently going through war. Russian air strikes of my city are very common, almost daily, so there's always a risk that at some point, it might be my house that gets damaged. Something as fragile as a piece of paper is likely to perish under such circumstances.
I'm not recommending digital storage to anyone, I realize it's dangerous in its own ways. But that's just the way I do it.

Diversification should not be forgotten. Not only of financial assets, but also of risk diversification. That is, having backups in different locations.

I am not sure that even storing the seed phrase NOT on paper, but, say, on a piece of metal, would allow the lost bitcoins to be returned (in this case after a fire). The metal plate would probably survive, but would it be possible to find it? Can you imagine a 70-year-old woman looking under a pile of burnt garbage? Although this contradicts BTC-freedom, it seems to me that in the future, providing your seed phrase to 3rd-party companies for storage (like storing money in a bank) will be a common and usual thing. I will not say that I like this prospect (a service with storing pharse with 3rd-party service providers), but such stories with fires and grandmothers, phrase storing service providers will undoubtedly be exploited. Not storing crypto in exchangers, but a service for storing seed-phrase (most likely in encrypted form).

Ok. But where should grandma store her bitcoins, if this house was her only one, and she had no relatives? Backups are, of course, good, but the question arises, where to store them? Under a tree on someone else's property?

When it comes to the issues of fire, i know how disastrous it could be and then also, i expect such to have been within the woods or wild and thick bush and not where can be close to human aboard, however, we cant predict the end result of anything like this until we saw where it landed.

Secondly, i strongly advice that we should always learn to have alternatives to how we are saving our keys, we should not only be left with a single choice, what if there is a sudden issue with that one and only means of storage.

When you are in this situation, your life is most important and if you could not take your wallet backup with you, it was burried in ground, ashes, it will be very difficult to find it later when fire gone. Hope is so small and I don't know how you can find it under a collapse house and with other things around it.

Prevention is better, and when you could not have it, hope for rescuing your wallet or wallet backup after the wildfire is very small.

My advice makes sense for urgencies if you value your bitcoin and its backup as one of most important things.

Well, that could be the best solution so far. However, that should be done in multiple secured locations so that if one location becomes inaccessible, at least the other locations remained safe and accessible. I’ll just hope this LA wildfire reminds everyone, and all crypto holders to secure their seed phrases at a maximum level. Otherwise, they will be the next target to lose their bitcoin assets when an unexpected disaster suddenly happens.

Every suggested method is a good one, but in the case of what happened to the woman, which the OP shared, I think the last part could have been her best option, considering her age, saving in different secured locations and not just within her home, probably in other cities if that's possible. 
 
Because you could use any of the other methods, the backup will become safe from water or the fire outbreak, but with what happens in LA, many activities to clean up the place will be going on, and the backup could either easily get exposed to the third eye or misplaced unknowingly.

It is truly painful for anyone who experienced catastrophe like this mass wildfire, but I can have an advice for everyone who live anywhere with their Bitcoin storage and Bitcoin wallet backups.

Be well organized, and be neat with your practice so you are disciplined with where you store your bitcoin, wallets, backups. It will be very helpful for you when such accident appears, you will not waste your limited precious time like some seconds, minutes to take it, go out and run.

If you have to think where you store it, run around your home to find it and spend a lot of time for finding it, you will have big risk to lose it and even lose your life.

Losing a home is already painful, but losing your private key to access your Bitcoin hurts more, especially since it could’ve been saved if the owner had taken proper measures to safeguard it. That Bitcoin might have been used to rebuild the house, even if insurance covered some of the loss. Life after such an event is still tough, and with Bitcoin’s current price, it would’ve been ideal to cash out during times of need but now it’s gone.

Let’s hope this never happens to us in the future. So let's ensure our private keys are protected.

If storing them at home isn’t safe, engraving them and keeping them in a vault, or even distributing copies of the seed phrase to different cities, can be a solution. Just make sure it’s secure and can’t be stolen, because losing access to your funds is just as painful.

I don't know if I can say that in person to those affected by the wildfire and if they have lost their entire lifesaving in Bitcoin. But you're right, someone should take it as a mantra and belief in life. We have to keep on living and how we deal with today and tomorrow varies on how we perceive that better days are coming, the recovery might take in process but people that are struggling in life that have went through devastation will never stay at that situation forever unless they let themselves stuck into it and can't move on. I know it's hard to move on but time will come and it will help them eventually.

This is absolutely devastating. Unfortunately, natural disasters are events that occur unexpectedly or mostly when we're not prepared and the outcomes are usually heartbreaking and at different levels. This is the reason why it is very important for us to prepare against it at any point and not to play with methods in which we can safeguard our investments.

Although every community has historically one or two different types of natural disasters their prone to, however, events can change and sometimes new disasters erupt. But to be at a safer side, it is best to adopt multiple strategies towards backing up our seed phrase physically and one of it is through stainless steel wallets. Since these wallets are harder conditions such as fire, water or corrosion.

For instance, if grandma had backed up her private key using hard stainless steel wallet, the wildfire that engulfed her home would have left the private key unarmed, likewise if she had stored it in multiple locations such as her residential home and her hometown.


As you made reference to what happened in Libya, I also reflected what happened in the city of Dubai last year. I can still remember vividly how an heavy rainfall almost washed away the larger part of Dubai city and some areas within the United Arab Emirates in April last year and reports had it that it was the heaviest rainfall to have been experienced by the city since the last 75 years ago. This flooding disaster was caused by drastic change in the climate but I don't think the magnitude of the rainfall was expected to be so massive as experienced by the people.

Imagine having only two different locations within the city and your private keys were stored there but despite that, the flooding still went ahead and washed away the backups. The truth of the matter is even if you got stainless seeds, although your chances of recovering them after the disaster is high, it does not stop the fact that they could be watched into the ocean.

In this case, can I also suggest that you could store your seeds or private keys on high-end encryption and stored digitally. For example, aside from your physical backups which must have been stored in multiple locations, having your private key stored using offline encrypted storage such as Veracrypt could be another helpful alternative or better still by using the SSS strategy via the Shamirs Secret Sharing scheme.

In this case, you will split up your private key into multiple parts and stored using tools like Shamirs Backup. When that's done, no one can combine it into a usable complete private key without your consent. You make it a bit more puzzling to arrange but with your conceived format of arrangements.

Such incidents are truly heartbreaking. Several people have lost their lives in the wildfires in Los Angeles. Many people have also lost their homes. Where their homes have been completely destroyed, they have also lost their belongings. One of the reasons for storing Bitcoin is to provide financial security to people, but when someone loses access to that Bitcoin, there is no guarantee of getting financial security. I really feel bad for that old woman. If she had access to her Bitcoin at this time, she could have used it in this disastrous moment. There are no words to comfort her, but this is a lesson for those who are new. Those who are storing private keys on paper can correct their mistakes from this incident. Try to keep safe any important information in multiple places so that everything is not lost in a moment or any disaster.

It was a 70 year old woman.


According to the report, it was just the private key that got destroyed, so it was probably written on paper.

This is why engraving it is the best solution. Even in the event of a fire, the seed phrase will still be intact. I think this is a crucial lesson for everyone holding crypto, they should consider engraving their seed phrases to ensure their security, learning from this unfortunate experience of the old woman.

First of all I'm sorry to read that someone besides the house even lost his bitcoins... At the same time I'm impressed that a 70-year-old person would use/own bitcoin. Now of course it's too late but another solution would have been leaving another cold wallet in another place, like a bank or her kids' house: she wouldn't have access to the private key but she could still access the funds, buy another cold wallet with a new private key and move them there.

Not right away, but in the long run, losing Bitcoin means a reduced supply in circulation, which can eventually have an impact. However, if there’s an instant price change, it’s likely just due to hype or FUD. And since the exact amount lost wasn’t reported, it probably won’t have much effect.

This topic is more about spreading awareness that we shouldn’t be too complacent when holding Bitcoin in the future. We need to explore all possible ways to secure it. Everyone here has shared different strategies, and I think they’re very helpful. Hopefully, if the 70-year-old woman reads this thread, it might encourage her to restart her investment journey despite what happened.

Sad story, but when living in a fire prone area you have to act accordingly to secure your assets.
Paper is not a good method since it is easily destroyed by fire, flood, hurricane, etc.

Many steel and titanium backup options exist for bitcoin can be bought on Amazon and other websites.

Using paper to store bitcoin is just as bad as storing your life savings in cash in your closet which can be easily destroyed in a fire.
If you are not very tech savvy or just don't want to deal with the hassle of seedphrase backup then consider investing in a bitcoin ETF.

This guide  Securing Your Seed Phrase with Washers written over two years ago by  fillippone will always be gold.
I encourage everyone to go and read it. It is a simple DIY. I find DIY fun.

I would like to first express my condolences to the people affected by the wildfires in California. This is a sudden event. There is probably nothing anyone can do about it.

I feel so sorry for the poor grandma because she lost everything in this fire and is completely destitute. However, she was a little less careful about holding Bitcoin because if she had Bitcoin, the seed of the wallet where she kept her Bitcoin should not have been written on paper but rather it should have been written on a metal object or she should have used a hardware wallet.

Every Bitcoin user should be very careful about holding Bitcoin, but the most important thing is to store the seed of the Bitcoin wallet very safely so that it can be recovered later even if it is damaged by various natural disasters.

I guess there are more unreported cases like that and people really need to evaluate their way of securing their keys and try to know what possible risk to get in their places so that they would know how to take care well those important details they have.

To bad for old woman to lose his Bitcoin on unfortunate incident happen in LA since that's huge money gone for a tragic incident happened in their place. Hopefully they bounce back and learn on how to secure well their keys especially they already try those incident.

Is there any news about what happen to old woman? If she's doing well despite of those tragic incident happen then everything still fine. Since property and money can recover but life provably won't so better try again next time and be more careful dealing with their online funds or investment.

Living in a hot area where wildfires have been the norm for years and holding your stash on a piece of paper is insane.  I would generally argue it is pretty unlikely to be the victim of a wildfire, but in California that is something to definitely consider.  At that point, the grand mother was playing roulette with her stash.

Even if she had no time to save her Seed before running away, she could have still gone back to the location of the house and likely find the Seed if she were to store it on washers.  This is valid even if she did not bury it into the ground!  Because even in the hottest and most extreme wildfires, the temperature STILL does not reach the melting point of steel.

Unfortunate and I am sorry for the grandmother but this was all on her.

Yes, it is true that it's better if you have backup of your private key, seed phrase in different location in case something happens to your house. It really sucks when you work hard for it only to lose it due to the natural disaster. It's also important that a person shouldn't tell anyone about his/her holdings as to avoid getting robbed or stolen because there are news about it. Using paper to write private key would also be okay if you know where to store it like put it in a box something that won't melt or burn right away or buried in land somewhere in your backyard something like that.

That's my mantra in life as well - "as long as we live, there's hope." If you give up easily in this life, you will fail. But if you will continue, sooner or later, you will just remember those dark days and be grateful that you have surpassed that stage.
And when it comes to say back-up of what we have, we have alternative options being considered like how are you storing your funds, whether in crypto or regular fiat. Each mode of funds has their own way of storing and keeping for safety purposes. It is your prerogative how you will keep them for your own security.

I'm afraid I don't have good backup system. My seed words are on regular piece of paper. Previously I had them on flash drive, but then I found out that flash drives are not considered permanent storage. Somewhere I found information that they can lose data over time.

Your thread is good reminder to me to take care of my seed and to create backups.

If some big whales lose their Bitcoins like that, it could increase price if the information become public. I've heard those destructive wild fires are mainly hitting wealthy neighborhoods of Hollywood and ones of the most expensive areas of all US, there are certainly rich businessmen holding large amount of cryptos living there. I don't hope that for them of course, but if they lose their bags like that and it's publicly known soon after, it could push up the price to some extent.

In terms of protection from fire, a fire proof safe or (even safer, since some safes can only protect against fire for so long) etching your keys on metal.

That really sucks and we hate it to see someone lose their savings because of that devastation. Each of us needs to find ways to keep our assets and private keys. Back-ups are important but not through the cloud but through physical ways of keeping it. Not to be bias, I hope that all of the people that have been affected by wild fire in there will recover and start again with their lives. I know that it's tough for most of them that don't know how to do it from the beginning but as long as they live, there's still hope.

We have discussed about how to secure BTC in cases of natural disasters, you can use a stainless steel to store your seed phrase and you should also have more than one backup of your seed phrase and store one of it in a different location, this can save you if your location is struck by a natural disaster. However, in situations like this, you will be lucky to save your life and it will be of higher priority than your funds.

This is why I always suggest everyone to remember seed phrases but definitely, this doesn't apply to this 70 years old woman but I think that every young person with good cognitive abilities should try and memorize seed phrases of their wallet (Of course, in this case, seed has to be 12 words and not 24. Overall, I find it stupid to have 24 words seed phrase because 12 words is already enough).

Buying a fireproof and damage proof metal backup solution is a must but it doesn't 100% solve the problem because when there is a big fire like this one, there is a high chance that when everything settles, someone might steal the plate or they won't be able to find it, so it's a good idea to remember seed phrases or have another backup on a different location.

This thing also come in my mind that I will loss custody of my coins if my only backup is lost due to some reason. You pointed out in the right direction that we must have multiple copies of our seed that are stored at different geographical locations. In case one copy is destroyed, we have another in place. For security purpose most of us do not store seed digitally rather write it on paper, it's also the simplest and safest way to secure your seed. Just as OP mentioned there can be incidents of fire that can destroy the paper.

Multiple backups and keeping them in multiple locations that are not close to each other is very important. Natural disaster like flood, earthquakes, hurricane, etc. can make people not to even identify the former location of their homes. The Libya flood of in 2023 destroyed 25% of the city of Derna. Stainless seed can be buried or be washed into the ocean when some natural disaster occur.

In such a situation, the only thing that can help you is to diversify the storage of private keys (seeds).

There is a famous proverb - "My home is my castle/fortress/citadel." However, any fortress/castle/citadel can perish or be taken by storm.

In my opinion, a true Bitcoin enthusiast must be paranoid. He must constantly ask himself questions. What happens if my house burns down, drowns, falls into the ground or is blown up? Will I be able to save my Bitcoins? What happens if when I go outside, I am arrested on a fictitious basis and spend 20 years in prison? When I am released, will I be able to regain access to my coins?

Asking yourself such questions and trying to find answers to these questions, you can create the perfect Bitcoin storage system for yourself.

Easiest way is to make your bitcoin backup more secure and resistant to fire and water is by using stainless seed instead of regular paper.
Cheapest option is buying stainless regular bolt and steel washers in your local store, and than adding words with a tool and hammer.
Another good advice is to create multiple backups and place them in totally different locations.

some people may call you crazy and a little too anxious for nothing but it is always better safe than sorry

we can't predict when or if things like this will ever happen so it is good to plan ahead like you said diversify the coins you are holding some people may find it more dangerous to not have all of their coins by their side at all times but you never know what can happen to you or to your house which could lead to the loss of your wallet do not be too confident and have more than one wallet stored in more than one location and keep backups of your seed phrases or passkeys and such to ensure that whatever happens you can still gain access to your bitcoins

bitcoin will not be loss but your access will be if you do not try to be careful

@hd49728 recommended some great ways to safeguard crypto investments through the linked topics, but I’m not sure if a 70-year-old woman would take the time to explore those options. She may have felt secure enough using a hard wallet and storing it in a vault. Unfortunately, a catastrophic event like this happened - something no one could have predicted would be this severe.

Topic on mass wildfire in Los Angeles, California is available.
Something to pounder for crypto enthusiast regarding LA wildfire

Some other topics discuss on importance of wallet backup methods resilient to catastrophes.
Keeping or recovering seed phrases during or after a natural disaster
Beirut explosion - Lesson to learn from this.

How to back up a seed phrase?
Have your backups in metal is one of best ways. Metal Bitcoin storage reviews.
If you are interested in this method, you can use this to find best brand for you.

I’m sure most people are aware of the ongoing wildfires in LA, which still seem to be relentless, we have a topic in connection bitcoin.


Poor grandma. This is exactly why we should always have a backup location for our hard wallets. Even if we don’t anticipate these things, they can still happen. It was not only her house that was lose but she also lost her Bitcoin investment. It’s a tough situation, but it’s a strong reminder of how important it is to have proper backups, and things should be planned ahead.