Bitcoin Forum

We all know blockchain.info, and we all knew mtgox.com.

How safe is it to store bitcoins in blockchain.info
How do i know that they will not get the money and run? Or something similar.

You're an idiot if you store any sore of value on a web wallet in which you don't have alternate access to the private keys.
Blockchain.info is great if you've used it to import some of your own private keys and use it as a mobile wallet.. but using it with their genereated addresses without having the private keys is stupid and you risk losing everything if it goes down.

With blockchain.info you have the private keys, mtgox was the one with the private keys.

Blockchain.info you own the coins, with mtgox it was mtgox who owned the coins, cryptographically speaking...

its one of the most popular bitcoin wallet,but it is always suggested that you keep your bit amount of bitcoins to offline/desktop wallet,but for small amounts it can be trusted, some people use exchange as their online wallet that is worst then using online wallet because they don't have private keys in case of exchange shutdowns.

Not as safe as you think. Blockchain.info is a wallet which allows users to have their private keys and is open sourced. Private keys are generated client side and the server only has the encrypted private key. Password is also never transferred over the internet. Technically, this should be quite secure, as long as
#1 You used strong passwords
#2 The encryption is strong enough to deter any bruteforce attacks.
However, being an online wallet,
#1 they are susceptible to hacks and a hacker can potentially put a script to capture the passwords that are used to unlock the wallets. 2FA would not help. 2FA is a client side protection which only allows wallets to be downloaded to browser if the code is correct.
#2 They can implement changes without any authorization from a trusted third party.
  

• This happened one time in December last year. They implemented a code change which affected the randomness of the private keys and in turn allowed generation of insecure and non random private keys, causing attackers to permanently gain access to the keys generated during that period.

#3 Malware can still steal your wallet no matter how you secure it.
#4 If there is a vulnerability in SSL and you're using Tor, it is possible for an attacker to capture the wallet backup.
#5 It has a central validation system. Blockchain.info can trick users to accept non existent transactions or double spends.

SPV clients are arguably several thousand times more secure than this.

Blockchain is safe as well as unsafe! ;)

It's safe when you are downloading their client-side chrome app and using it from there. In this case you're not letting Blockchain to save your keys in their servers.

It's unsafe if you use Blockchain online. That way you're giving them the access to your keys as well as to any malware on your computer which needs an internet connection to perform it's malfunction.

#The safest way to use Blockchain is to import your public key in "watch-only" mode in order to review your transactions and input your private key whenever you are about to send some funds to anyone. And as always use the client-side app.

That sounds like some great advice to the OP as well as me. I use blockchain as my online wallet as well. Of course I got an offline one as well but these are some great tips. Thank you.

I use online wallet every now and then for my transactions, I don't have hug transactions anyway. If its less than a hundred, i don't think someone will hack my account for such amount.  I only keep about $50 in my blockchain wallet and send the rest to my armory wallet just be be safe. the point is don't store much for your online wallet, just keep something that you could spend.

the only safe online wallet would be coinbase, because they have insurance against losses of money especially vs hacker

and because they are heavily regulated and in touch with IRS itself

Hackers/Key-loggers are such punks that they will hunt for accounts having $1 also. Yes!


I also suggest you to get any one of the hardware wallets for added safety. Just search on the forum for hardware wallets and you'll get to know about their securities on their ANN threads.


And what will they probably do with your funds if the price of BTC/USD spikes to $1000? ;) Just recall what happened with MT-Gox...

i use multibit HD not the on line but to see the blocks i do connect to that site and the confirms but the wallet there i dont use never the less its for just a few satoshis but if wes more i would store into a pen multibitHD

Keep small amount of BTC at online wallet, and big one on desktop or paper wallet. If web wallet goes down you lose all your BTC

i used Blockchain at first when i started using bitcoin because of its ease of use and the fact that it is a reputable bitcoin business,  however once i read about bitcoin security and inpaticualer the bug in their address last year i removed all my bitcoin to paper wallets which i now have as watch only addresses in blockchain.  

now i have the best of both worlds, ease off use and great security  ;D

Coinbase insurance only covers inside hacks. If you get hacked due to a malware, it is in no way covered.
Blockchain.info is not affected in this way. They allow users to export private key which would give the user full access to the funds even if they are down. They don't have your unencrypted private key in the first place.

well if you get hacked because of malware it's your fault, and no client is secure in this case, so this is another story

coinbase isnt a wallet; if you yourself do not control the private keys, its not a wallet. its just a place you can store your bitcoin relatively safely.

I don't recommend any one to store their coins online. No matter if it is at blockchain.info or on an exchange. Companies can mostly be trusted, but there are always hackers and thiefs inside the company itself performing an inside job. I like the saying ; 1 Bitcoin offline is worth more than 2 Bitcoins online.

I would call coinbase a type of online or web wallets but it has an option for Vault

OP, whatever you use be sure you are safe yourself, your devices and then check the company service.

Both coinbase and xapo does not offer private keys but they are pretty good to safe little amount of bitcoin.

Yes, its a better system for users because of this. Of course you are still needing to trust the functionality of the website and that it has close to 100% uptime.

Close to 100% uptime is ~true but during attacks/ddos which happened frequently in the previous months , you will have a nightmare, i used blockchain.info for almost a year but I finally gave up and let only my empty address to sign a message with it if needed.

Correct, assuming Blockchain.info claims are true.

If you have your keys you don't need 100% uptime, has you'll be able to move your coins if blockchain.info isn't available.

That's a good point. If you had the private keys then you could go to a different wallet. For those new to the system, it's all about that private key. With it everything is fixable, without it there is no hope.

@OP,
No wallets are safe unless you have an offline wallet with your private keys stored somewhere in some safe disk or blades (pendrives)...
Even blockchain.info wallets get hacked, I am myself seeing somebody trying to login into my account, thanks to myself I had 2-Factor Authentication enabled on my wallet...

Blockchain.info wallet is no longer listed at the recommended wallets list at the https://bitcoin.org/en/choose-your-wallet, they were listed there at one time but they were removed, surely they must have done something wrong which caused their removal. That should be enough to make people understand that its not safe, you can keep a small amount of bitcoins there but even that is at risk and why take any risks when there are so many other safer options available.

Good to know that.  Granted that a user had exported his private key, how would he access his wallet while site is down? And can he still send the funds to another wallet?

If you have the keys, you can import it into any other wallet like, Core, Electrum etc. and take hold of your funds.

Thank you for the info.
I am going to download Bitcoin Core and store my Bitcoins there.
Malware Bytes + Bit-defender are already installed on the PC, so i suppose I will be safe if i do not download every shit program that is on youtube, etc.
I am going to store private keys offline or on a usb.

Any further advise?

Regards

just thought i ask.....is investing in he trezor hardware wallet worth it

I would advise you to store keys and password seperate. I stored half of my passprase online and the other half on 2 USB's of which one also have my wallet.dat.
This combination feels safe to me.

Yes!  Assuming you have more than, say, $400 or so in Bitcoin.

I keep a small balance at blockchain.info, mostly for receiving payments, then sending them on to bitmixer.io and/or blockchain.info's SharedCoin service on the way to my Trezor.