Bitcoin Forum

Never losing access to your crypto funds ever again. Coinbase now lets you secure your key phrase in Google Drive and iCloud.

“The private keys generated and stored on your mobile device are the only way to access your funds on the blockchain. Owners of ‘user-controlled wallets’ like Coinbase Wallet sometimes lose their devices or fail to back up their 12-word recovery phrase in a safe place, thus losing their funds forever,” as noted in the announcement.

Read more here: https://www.unblock.news/news/coinbase-now-lets-you-backup-your-keyphrase-in-google-drive-and-icloud

that is a horrible idea!

you always want to be in control of your private keys. otherwise what is the point of using bitcoin in first place? stick to using fiat and the banks if you want to use services such as coinbase to keep your keys. not to mention that backing up secret stuff like this on the cloud has always been the least secure way even if you encrypted them.

Source: https://www.unblock.news/news/coinbase-now-lets-you-backup-your-keyphrase-in-google-drive-and-icloud

This is stupid if most people use "password1234" or similar; then must use LastPass to remember strong passwords.
Just write the backup phrase on a piece of paper and keep it safe.
Humans like to complicate things!

I don't really get it. How difficult could it be to write down 12 words on paper and store the piece of paper somewhere safe in your home? Why would you risk your private key by storing it online, be in Google Drive or iCloud, doesn't matter? I would be surprised if this was implemented by a lesser known exchange, but this coming from Coinbase, really strange. This is a terrible decision by Coinbase and really a very poor practice. Or am I missing something?

no I wouldn't be using that service.
Its a gimmick to entice newbies to Coinbase, making it seem as easy
as possible to create an account and "you don't have to remember passwords etc."
Google will take care of it.

Well if people cannot even bother to store their own passwords without
using a third party they are asking for trouble, not only that but we
shouldn't be considering storing coins long term ONLINE.

Coinbase is already as shady as it gets, they hide behind the KYC rules to decide which person will get their withdrawals and which ones will have to wait months.

Look at online complaints for them and you can see when accepting 10+ bitcoins for deposit they have absolutely no warning, no issues just takes the money right away but when someone wants to withdraw 10+ bitcoins all of a sudden its a KYC issue and they require time and more research. Where was the research and so forth while that user was depositing his money ? Nobody asks "where did you find this money" when that person deposits but all of a sudden its an issue when he wants to withdraw. All this keyphrase and google drive and icloud things are just trying to look like they are a legit company but in reality they are one of the last places I would use.

Nice teaming up, of course, but I agree with BrewMaster on this matter. I would never leave my recovery phrase or private key on google drive, because it's too vulnerable and can rather easily be hacked and accessed. At the same time, even though I know the safest way is to print out some copies and leave them in safe places, I don't do that. I trust Telegram enough to have important data there. If someone steals my phone I could end up pretty badly, but it never happened to me before, so yeah, I use this app to store important data.

That is a good one by Google drive to be able to store our wallet backup keys on a drive cause in that way we can not lose our found, I still remember when I lose some good amount of bitcoin in my wallet all because I could not remember my secret keys of recovery phrase but wit coinbase Google drive storage and secured.

Although it appears to be a bad security risk i have to say it is a good idea. Some people e.g. the elderly have very poor memory and can only remember a few things. This will help those guys and let them get into the bitcoin game

If this is the case then I expect Coinbase to come up with a better solution for them than this. I'm sure plenty of people do this already. To have it endorsed by Coinbase isn't a great look.

Never used Coinbase but this is not a good idea from my point of view.

we are not in the future like 2025 or something like that when bitcoin has reached mass adoption so much that even old people are using it!!! we are in 2019 where those more familiar with the technology are still not so keen on buying bitcoin because it is volatile. and they don't need such services.
not to mention that these services are always being advertised as "ultra secure". we already have a couple of these "vaults" where they give you all kinds of promises just to take your money and have control over it.

You mean we send our privekey to the cloud? lol  If you remember the flappenning where the nude photos of celebrities are leaked? These kind of exploit can always happen again, how much more if there are millions of money to be taken from the wallets. The cloud will be the first target of these hackers. This is one of the craziest idea, congrats to the person who has the brightest who suggested this,.

Nice application but but this is good security?  The important thing is whether it is safe or not. google drive and the like can be hacked. it is best to write a private key on a piece of paper and keep it at home.  That's what I do. :)
 

I am kind of shocked! Since when the cloud is a safe place to store your valuable secrets!!! Apart from using coinbase which is not a good idea since you could not control your money, now they offer you a second chance to multiply that risk... Just wow!

I agree that it's a very bad idea. Coinbase also allows you to set up a cold storage for your coins which is giving you a false sense of security. If you keep anything online and it can be on an exchange or on a cold wallet managed by this exchange or on their cloud it's never secure! It may be a bit more secure if you compare this to some smaller exchanges that don't even know what a cold wallet is but it's still dependent on the people running said exchange.

Yes, it's a bad idea to save keyphrase on Google Drive and iCloud because we never know how they can protect the customer data. If we are losing the data, we cannot complain to them, and they will blame us because we cannot secure our account. It's better to save the keyphrase in the place that only me that will know rather than to save in the cloud because I can keep the secret for myself better than the cloud itself.

of course this is an increase in service from Coinbase for its customers, so they are safer, of course, Coinbase wants to be the favorite exchange of bitcoiners. and I give him appreciation

I found this as a great security leak... to backup phrase in a cloud... NEVER!
I never used COinbase because they had issues with wallet using funds for gambling and now this... I will never use them!

Although it is a good service from Coinbase, I don't think that it will be saved with a good. I don't underestimate with the Coinbase security system, but I don't like to save my private data or private keys in the Cloud. I remember that in the past, someone account got hacked on her cloud account and her private photo was spreaded to the public. It is not guaranteed to save your privacy in the cloud or other online saving data center because when we touch the internet, it means our data will be publicly soon. It is always better to save your private keys offline.

I'd prefer to keep it myself instead of using Coinbase. Why should people use an online service/ cloud platform to backup keyphrases and passwords? What if they got hacked? Only one potential leak could lose billions of assets for thousands of people. I may use this service only for small funds, but I'll never go for my big bag keys. Stay safe.

This is a bad idea because storing your keys in the cloud increases the likelihood that they will fall to fraudsters. I will never go for it, it's just stupid.

While I think this will ensure you have the full control of your account, saving your key phrase into something that is easily accessible using the internet connection is a bad idea. All hackers now need is to have your Google account and your password to access your Google drive and cloud.

You have to be mad to do it! In this case, you may lose the funds, a bad idea and I will never accept these conditions.

hackers cant hack your google account as well as icloud too easily because both have solid security encryptions .  this idea is actually nice because we know dont need to copy our seeds manually  , instead we can now  just export it to a cloud storage for ease of access  .


Why would you use online wallet and online exchange ?  Thats more worst because you are entrusting your account to some one else  .  what if they will hack ?  Google and apple have a higher and better security than those who were in online wallets and exchanges   . so dont under estimate them because they are in the industry for many years before crypto invented .