Bitcoin Forum

Are paper wallets really secure?
I want to hold some BTC and I want o secure the best way I can.
Besides paper wallets what other options do I have?

I heard they are the most safe of all wallets. Except fire or whatever problems your house hit.

I use paper wallet generated automatically by website. Im feeling pretty safe.
Paper wallet advantage is that you can hide it in book and its really hard to find by someone random.

A paper wallet is really convenient if you want to deposit, but it's really annoying to withdraw from. While you're creating it, a hacker could screen capture the privkey, be your computer connected to the internet or not.

I use a HW.1 hardware wallet, because it's convenient and highly secure

Paper wallets are highly secure. This can be used to retain your account when you have lost everything due to some file corruption. The process behind the paper wallet system also very simple.

Hardware wallets can be highly secure aswell.  Keep in mind when you do one most give you seeds to put on pater and store safely (I prefer safety deposit box).

On paper wallets make sure computer is secure, and not compromised. Also he older and dumber the printer the better.  If a new printer look how to reset cache to get rid of paper wallet in cache of printer.  Paper wallets can be very secure but you have to make it in a secure way.

I hope you trust that website 100% to not store a copy of your private keys...

And hope no hacker gets into their database because they almost certainly have a copy...

The info is also transmitted across the internet, which could get intercepted...

Paper wallets are secure only if you take the proper precautions before printing them, the whole process should be done on an offline computer which stays offline or an air gapped OS.

Other than that you should encrypt them to protect from someone else using them and you also need to make sure you keep the paper safe from any degradation.

Electrum (https://electrum.org/#download) can be used to keep funds in a cold storage too and it is also very safe, and only thing you have to remember is your Seed.

paper wallets are not something magical that can keep your bitcoin safe. they are private keys written (printed) on a piece of paper. so if you create the private key in a safe way (right code and on a clean computer) and then encrypt it before printing, then it is safe.


if you want to spend money, you can use hardware wallets like trezor.
if you don't want to spend money (spend a little money) you can buy a USB disk like me and create a live linux with Electrum on it and set it so it will never connect to internet and that would be your hardware wallet.

My opinion about paper wallet is save from hacker but it is dangerous from fire and human error are like forget put the wallet, rate  attack and another mistake  ;D

it is not dangerous if you have several copies of it stored in different safe places like what i did to my paper wallet :)

yeah, you can also laminate that paper in order to preserve it better for longer period of time. but if you are paranoid and want to keep the paper wallet safe from water, fire, acid, ... engrave it on a stainless steel.

Also be careful what place you consider safe.  Some might look at safe's that truly are not safe.  Here is a interesting video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ApJQ2wcYjBo (this video will scare some that thought they had a good place with some safes).

Basically cheap part's allow some safes to be opened via strong magnet.  And it's not a bad looking safe if you went out and spent 250 or so on a safe you would think it would be stronger then this.... but not all safes are.  I really suggest safty deposit box if your storing a lot of coins.

i choose electrum to save guard my coins,and i am pretty happy with it,i use my old lap as a cold storage to secure my coins.

The risk of getting your coins stolen on your computer is much greater than that of a paper wallet in your house or it being cought in a fire or something.

That aside, if your paper wallet is generated offline on a clean computer it is probably as safe as it gets. No other method such as hardware wallet can create a safer private key (it is just as safe with regards to crackability) if you don't want to use it on a regular basis.

Also, when you create these paper wallets, make sure you use a printer not connected to the internet. There have been rumors of people accessing the cached content on these printers and gaining sensitive information.

I once made a copy of one of my paper wallets on the office photo copier and we had a incident where we needed to retrieve scanned documents for forensic evidence, and much to my surprise, my paper wallet was also retrieved from the restored documents on the internal hard drive in that photo copier. 

I now create paper wallets completely offline and in duplicate copies to store at different locations.

wow. I did not know this!
I think the way to prevent this (especially for somebody like me who does not own a personal printer at home and has to use a public printer) is to encrypt the private keys that you want to print with a strong password so that the printed letters on the paper will become meaningless to other people unless they have the password.

That's what the BIP38 is for. Create a paper wallet encrypted with password and resist bruteforce password cracking.

I think the most vulnerable time for paper wallets is when you create them.  Otherwise they're safe.  Just don't lose the public or private keys.

You may want to create a bunch of paper wallets and just hold on to them for a few years to use them later.  Then you know they are probably secure.

they are not safer than a common usb stick for example, maybe cheaper but that's it, every single thign have a vunlnerability that depend on the user not so much on the method used to store your coins

Ok thanks for complete my opinion  ;D

they are pretty secure as long as you dont give away your private key, i think no one can steal bitcoins from paper wallet

I didn't try paper wallets personally. But according to some world class website's review it it most secured wallet ever.
Both desktop and web based wallet can be hacked but impossible to hack paper wallet.

The key thing is if it is done right on un-compromised equipment.  Paper wallet is not 100 percent secure unless done right.  If you overlooked something or had something bad on your computer you might feel safe and think you are... but you are not.

Yes can be stolen, or burnt or forgotten, lost between books etc.
Maybe is safest but i wonder how practical really is?

Yes, If you generate the wallet on a machine that does never have access to the internet.

Download the walletgenerator software here https://github.com/MichaelMure/WalletGenerator.net

Put it to a machine without internet connection and generate the wallet. The cool thing that you can generate wallets for the following coins with it (list from the website www.walletgenerator.net):

42coin Acoin Alphacoin Animecoin Anoncoin Apexcoin Auroracoin BBQcoin Bitcoin BitcoinDark Birdcoin Blackcoin BunnyCoin CanadaeCoin CannabisCoin Capricoin CassubianDetk Catcoin Corgicoin CryptoBullion CryptoClub Cryptoescudo Dash DeafDollars Devcoin Digitalcoin Dogecoin DogecoinDark eGulden eKrona Emercoin EnergyCoin Fastcoin Feathercoin Fibre Fluttercoin Freicoin FUDcoin Fuelcoin Fujicoin GabenCoin GlobalBoost Goodcoin GridcoinResearch Gulden Guncoin HamRadioCoin HTML5Coin HyperStake ImperiumCoin IncognitoCoin Influxcoin IridiumCoin iXcoin Judgecoin Jumbucks Latium Litecoin LiteDoge MagicInternetMoney Magicoin Marscoin MarteXcoin MasterDoge Mazacoin Megacoin MobiusCoin MonetaryUnit Monocle MoonCoin Myriadcoin NameCoin Neoscoin Novacoin Nubits Ocupy Omnicoin Onyxcoin Paycoin Pandacoin Pesetacoin PHCoin PhoenixCoin Peercoin Potcoin Primecoin Quark Reddcoin Riecoin Rimbit Rubycoin Sambacoin SibCoin SongCoin SpreadCoin StealthCoin Syscoin Titcoin TittieCoin Topcoin TransferCoin TreasureHuntCoin Unobtanium USDe Vertcoin Viacoin VikingCoin W2Coin WankCoin WeAreSatoshiCoin WorldCoin Zetacoin

paper wallet is one of the safest possible wallets in my opinion as it is not on the computer so no one can steal it

It is very practical, you just have to be organised and remember where you keep your valuables.

In my point of view, paper wallet is secure enough. Surely the storage have different security but it is safe. But you should still to watchful in any risk if that will happen.

Can you tell me how to create a paper wallet.

Oh ? What is Paper Wallet! ? How to use that? How to Create that wallet?

Many good tips already... So here's mine:

When i first started playing with paper wallets, i made a couple testnet paper wallets, loaded them with testnet coins and sweeped them with the testnet android wallet... Just to learn the basics on how to generate, print, store, encrypt, decrypt, sweep,... them. This way, chances of losing coins because you're still learning are slimmer.

If after playing with testnet paper wallets, you're still not completely sure about what you're doing, create a  dogecoin paper wallet, load them with a small ammount of funds (freedoge.co.in gives you a couple dozen of coins in a couple of hours, so it's pretty "easy" to play with those)... This might be necessary because the bitcoin testnet isn't 100% stable, in my opninion the android clients don't always sync properly,...

The rest of the tips were fine
- download the sourcecode
- run it on an airgapped pc, maybe even in a live OS (live linux distro, nothing left behind on your PC after rebooting)
- print on a local printer
- use BIP38 encryption
- laminate
- store at 2 different, safe, locations

OR use a HW wallet

Paper wallet is bitcoin wallet where you can hold your bitcoins with private keys of your wallet and only visible with public key and QR Code for scan your wallet at any time and have bitcoins.

Also store paper wallets in some place safe.   I really like safety deposit box at bank, as you have bank level security.   I was talking to my local one they offered the very smallest one for like 16 bucks a year.  So crazy good price due to it being very small.  But that is all you need for a paper wallet.

I highly suggest others look at local banks even for storage for a copy.

I do not go for a single deposit box option. Store the Bitcoin address and the private keys in two separate banks for instance {which might sound like it is overkill} but what will happen if Bitcoin goes

mainstream and your single Bitcoin is worth $ 1 000 000? The $16 per year, is a small investment, if you consider that those Bitcoin might be valued at a much higher price in the future. If a box gets

compromised, the people cannot do anything, if the address cannot be matched to the private key.  ;D ;D ;D

Splitting it between 2 is not a bad idea, I think it's going to be overkill for most though.  But if you have a lot stored in cold wallet it does make sense.

I don't go for the 1 million number.  There is a entire thread about that.  If we even hit 10,000 I would consider huge win.  Heck 1k short term would be nice even.  But with amount of bitcoin out there, and that will be generated 1 million will never happen even if we get mass adoption.

This is really good advice, been a bit wary of making paper wallets in case I f*ck up and lose all my bitcoin :)

One quick question tho, I've heard that some models of printers store documents in their own memory. Do you think it's worth buying a cheap printer and then destroying it after the wallets are printed or is that tin foil level crazy?

paper wallets are extra secure. only way someone can hack your paper wallet would be if they somehow see what your printer prints or if they get their hands on your paper wallet in real life, other than that there are no worries with a paper wallet.

make sure to keep your paper wallet safe, save it on brankas or other safest place as like as your keep your fiat money or other important document, i personally save my paper wallet on those place
goodluck

Just a couple of answers/corrections to the last couple of posts:

1) it doesn't help storing your private key and address on two different places. All you need is the private key!!! The address isn't needed for spending bitcoins, if somebody imports the private key (and has never seen the address), he immediately knows the address and can spend all your coins. If you're completely paranoid, you might split the private key in different parts, store the parts in 3 banks, but make sure a combination of 2 banks always give you the complete private key (it's to early in the morning for the mathematical explanation).

2) it isn't needed to destroy the printer... Just make sure you connect the printer directly to your offline computer, and make sure it isn't connected to the network... Reboot the printer afterwards, if you're really paranoid: send a couple really big printing jobs to the printer afterwards and re-reboot and you're completely fine

You can store a private key, in a way that it's not recognisable to the average person. If you break it up in different sections and hide it in a book or some other item, the average Joe will not know

what it is. If you put something valuable inside the box, like a gold coin.. someone will rather steal that and leave the paper work. There are many ways to store these private keys, without anyone

knowing what they looking at.  ;)

paper wallet is key
so be carefull dont share key

Why going all the extra steps, when a hardware wallet like Ledger Nano HW1 costs only 20 USD , if you have large amount of Bitcoins you should definitely get a hardware wallet, as far as I know they are the most secured one.

I like paper wallets over HW wallets because i can store a couple of copys in different places (only with people/places i trust + with BIP38 encryption).
With a HW wallet, you can do the same for the seed, but it's harder to encrypt a couple of seed words, and if you do, you're basically making a "paper wallet" (eventough it's not a wallet, but a paper copy of the seed words).

Also, with paper wallets, you can make several, but if you have to buy several HW wallets, it might actually be pretty expensive.

I might be missing something here, but those are my 2 main reasons for sticking with paper wallets (eventough i might eventually buy a HW wallet to keep some "spending coins" safe... Keep my main stash on paper wallets, and keep my pocket change on the HW wallet)

I think its secure than other forms of bitcoin wallet. In other options you can use online wallet from blockchains.info maybe, because they were reliable and safe course. thank you

I would never advise somebody to use online wallets... When using these you're not in charge of your private key, so you're not in charge of your coins. Also, you open yourself up to all kinds of attacks, be it phising, keylogging,...
A paper wallet is a pretty good way of securing your assets, but you do have to be carefull how you handle these paper wallets. This forum has plenty examples on how to deal with them.

Bro online wallets are normally not safe even Blockchain also same in that category! Yesterday when i searched in google for Blockchain I have found site address called biockchains.info Which is have same kind of page layout, design and everything. Please be careful about that.

Paper wallet is more safe than other types of wallet. It is because you are the only one who knows where you keep it. You can keep it inside a book and put it inside a vault or whichever way you want. Unlike online wallets, remember that they have employees with them. If those people are bad they could steal your bitcoin.

Paper wallets you have to create it in a safe environment, and if used has to be safe to.  So risky to import your wallet onto a computer as it really gets rid of the offline security you had.

There are hardware wallets like Trezor that you could use and even if on a compromised system should not lose BTC.  This is due to signing being on the hardware device.  So paper wallets are great for longterm storage.   I just see using the paper wallet as kinda the weakness.

that is not why they are safe at all!
paper wallets are safer because there is no internet connection that can reach paper! so none of the common ways of stealing bitcoin (like hacking) works for it.

and also paper wallets are only safe if you have created them correctly. which means you have to generate the wallet (private keys) with the right code and on a clean computer which has always been offline.