Bitcoin Forum

I still use Electrum the few times when I send BTC transactions, but just today i thought about, why isnt there a Browser extension wallet for BTC like Metamask for ethereum?

Metamask is a web wallet, you do not have to compare it with desktop wallet like Electrum. Web wallets are more susceptible to online attacks. You can just download electrum and use it offline if you want, what web wallets can not do. I am not saying electrum is not an online wallet, but not being a web wallet make people to have a choice to also use it as a cold wallet if they know how and want to.

I thought you were talking about brave browsers or something. Like I thought that that's not the use case of BTC. Bitcoin was made for purely peer-to-peer transactions without a middleman. Not be mined by watching ads to get a sure reward. It's an excellent idea but probably not going to be possible. This was just a thought

But in essence, I think it would be hard, and it can be compromised. Maybe a hot wallet of some sort.

Well perhaps you did not know the difference between the web wallet and the software-based wallet and it is open-source.
Some people did not want to install web browser extensions because it is very risky to use, --but why you are looking for a browser extension instead of a trusted software that you can download of course --you can verify the legitimacy through GPG signatures.

Indeed. MetaMask happens to be lucky that it has a strong commuity that not only maintains it but actively publishes a phishing list, phishing warnings and so on. But most other wallets do not have this kind of luxury, to have devs who are also sentries.

In the Chrome Web Store there are so many fake copies of legitimate wallets which swipe your coins if you enter your password. Also there are malicious extensions that imitate real extensions but do not look like wallets - these also steal coins.

Because it doesn't make sense for Bitcoin to have a wallet integrated into a browser plugin; it simply adds unnecessary risk. The reason why MetaMask needs to be a browser plugin, is because Ethereum users connect their MetaMask to "DeFi" websites.

Because being a web extension itself is a flaw, one that may not be easily compromised but CAN still be compromised. Not to mention that there were already safer options available that people were able to use. I think if you were to compare, Metamask was probably made for people new to the scene, testing stuff around kind of thing, while better wallets are for people who are pretty experienced and are holding a pretty good amount of coins in their wallet.

There are few that exists BUT I strongly advise against using them because they really serve no purpose while putting your bitcoin at risk for the sake of convenience^(really?)

- https://liquality.io/
- https://mathwallet.org/en-us/
- https://extension.crocobit.net/

I just don't know if their claim that they support bitcoin in their wallet is true since Metamask, a popular ERC-20 token wallet, can also store bitcoin but only in a wrapped version (wBTC)

Security reasons, that's it. Malware and virus came first from your browser's activity with that logic no bitcoin developer that priorities security will do the same to other ethereum-related wallet.
Although even if there is existing ^{(if there is)} no one will regularly use that wallet.

Web wallet is not the safest wallet type to use. Metamask is a web wallet.

In addition, Metamask is for multi chain, and token. Bitcoin has only one chain, Bitcoin blockchain, no token, so you only need a non custodial wallet to use for your Bitcoin storage and transactions.

https://cryptosec.info/checklist/
https://www.lopp.net/bitcoin-information/recommended-wallets.html
Some informative resources to read. With web wallet, you must trust that they don't store your seed when you creating your wallet. Not your keys, not your coin.

Web wallet or other wallet types, when you create your wallet, you should turn off Internet connection.

Obviously those bag holding ETH don't understand or care about their security otherwise they wouldn't have bought a centralized altcoin with a mutable blockchain in first place :)

Actually, there was one before and that's the greenaddress wallet. But eventually, they've stopped supporting it and made it as a desktop wallet.

But as said by many on this thread, there's a huge concern about security about it. Imagine those that have lost their ETH tokens because of connecting it to a website that they're about to invest, it's easy work for the scammers and hackers while them, giving that quick approval and confirmation that sometimes is the reason why they're scammed.

The only reason web wallets exist is for personal convenience. Which, of course, is a horrible trade-off for security but people are lazy like that. I guess 10 seconds of downloading a wallet is too much work for them. Or perhaps if something happens they want to have someone to blame other than themselves? Of course nobody will be there to help them, so I guess its the illusion of customer service that they prefer? ::)

Electrum is the best wallet so far, in my thinking.

And of course its decentralized, like every other wallet. So making a web version would not make sense anyway. If you have internet, you can download the wallet. Just hope that the site you download from has not been compromised.

Beyond the security implications, there seems to be nobody asking for it. If there were people asking / talking about it more people would be writing them and we would be discussing them.

I would not really want to use one for real amounts of money, but for keeping small amounts, under $25 or so, it might not be the worst. If you are only using 1 PC and occasionally want to get something with BTC having a high risk, vulnerable hot wallet with that amount give or take could be handy. No going for the HW wallet, or anything else. Obviously everyone would have their own amount of BTC they would be willing to risk.

-Dave

I think avoiding it because for security reasons it's not because it doesn't exist, it might be there if you look for it and I'm sure you will also lose your bitcoins if you use a wallet in a browser plugin, you should hold the btc in the ethereum wbtc network so you can store it in metamask or other

It is very easy for hackers to gain control of your browser. So wallets like Metamask is not really safe. This is good for micro transactions but if you are holding a good amount of money in your Metamask wallet, it is not really recommend!

Probably that's the reason no developer has yet created a secured browser extension like Metamask. It is always best to use a desktop or hardware wallet if you are holding some good amount of bitcoins. Electrum is quite good and used by a lot of fellow forum members.

There are some extension you can use as Bitcoin wallet, but I wouldn't suggest anyone should use this instead of Electrum wallet.
Many extensions can turn out to be a scam so watch out for that, but I think Liquality wallet is acceptable and it can be used as exchange with atomic swaps.
Safepal released their browser extension but it's closed source and I don't recommend anyone should use it.
 

Using a web-based wallet is unheard of using nowadays especially for bitcoin.
I remember using one when I was just getting acquainted in using this newly created asset of the digital space.
But it was more of a learning tool then to use as a daily driver for anything valuable enough to be concerned of losing if it did not work or hacked into.

Mostly everything that was related to being browser based has been transitioned into an app.
Such as blockchain.info(.com now) and Jaxx which is one I was referring to at beginning of this post.

Haven't used them in a long time and they had since changed their name to Jaxx Liberty.
But has since had people complaining of having their wallets hacked more frequently.
https://www.reddit.com/r/jaxx/comments/l86gi0/jaxx_liberty_wallet_hacked_need_help

If you hold WBTC, you're going to need to trust that WBTC's custodian is backing the WBTC with BTC 1:1. That's a huge unnecessary risk to take just so you can hold your "bitcoin" on a browser plugin. Honestly wouldn't do this unless you have a certain yield farming strategy you want to temporary take advantage of(assuming you totally know what you're doing as well).

That's not enough though since even if they had bitcoin 1:1 they are still owning those bitcoins and they can decide to never swap bitcoins for their own shitcoin or sell those bitcoins and go away. There is nothing people can do about it.

Browser extension wallets are very risky that's why I always recommend hardware wallets or computer software wallets. They are very rare. Hardware wallets don't have risks, but desktop wallets have mild risks, but I use hardware wallets for security reasons. Actually, desktop wallets and hardware wallets are very necessary for bitcoins, I don't think web extension wallets provide as much security. Speaking of me, my metamask has been hacked several times and my friends have also been hacked, so I never use metamask now.

If you are tired of using MetaMask you can also use a Blockchain wallet to store your Bitcoins and it is very safe, because Blockchain is a technology that is used as a digital storage system or cryptographically connected data bank. Its use is inseparable from Bitcoin and other Cryptocurrencies, so your Bitcoins are very safe and can be used wherever you are, because Blockchain also has applications for cell phones.

No one dares to do so because of the high risk of getting hacked and they will be likely sued by most of the people who use their wallets. So, No! as we know, sometimes there was an incidence where people can easily mimic an add-on wallet and spread it and you know what's surprising? it only needs a short time to execute its attack and thousands of dollars will be lost. Just like what happened with the ETH hack using browser cookies back then.

Almost all the tools like these are being released under licenses that prevents you from suing them if you end up losing any money. You should be able to find it under the Terms of Services for web wallets or if it is some sort of open source browser based extension or tool you should look at its license on github.
For example if something is released under MIT license you agree that any damages or loss is not the developer's fault before you begin using it.

Not quite like Metamask because it's not a browser extension wallet, but there is a very famous online Bitcoin wallet which you'd normally use in a browser. It is Blockchain digital wallet. Many don't trust it, many don't like it. I used to store my BTC there, and even though I had no issues and I don't think it's a scam or that they actually have access to private keys of their users or anything, Electrum isn't that hard to use and it's way more trusted, so I eventually switched to it. If you're already using Electrum, I suggest you stick to it.

I do agree that something like that could work, but the main reason why metamask got big is not ETH or BNB that you can use, it is the projects connected to the chains of these projects. These days 90% of all projects are either ERC20 based or BSC based and that means we are going to use metamask to join those projects, and that is why we do not have any big deals about bitcoin because only reason to use bitcoin would be bitcoin itself and not something else.

Considering how big the projects based on those chains became, it was normal for everyone to download metamask and then start using it, millions of people use it every day to participate in smaller projects.

I am not much tech guy but most likely it's a matter of a smart contract where users can connect the wallet to complete the transaction. Bitcoin doesn't have such functionality to deploy the smart contract. So it's unnecessary to create a wallet like metamask where you can't connect the wallet. Likely you may create it just as a regular wallet. Do you think this idea just came to your mind? I don't think, there are a lot of dev would think if it was possible.

I think metamask originally started as a browser extension but later on they implement a mobile app but for electrum, they originally started as a crypto wallet. Don't know if there are crypto wallets which now has a browser extension but I think there is non yet. All that I see so far, had the same origin as metamask and most of them stays like this even after a long time.

I guess they don't have a plan to totally copy metamask and will also develop their own app. Blockchain wallet is a browser wallet and this isn't the one the OP wants to have tho you are right that blockchain have gotten worse lately. Lots of complaints are being thrown at them while I haven't heard much of complaints in electrum.

There's a browser wallet extension made by crypto.com, a known crypto exchange but I just don't know if they support Bitcoin in it, or it's just something like wrapped tokens. Just from recent news when Metamask was involved on El Salvador-Infura case, I think browser wallet extensions are just centralized as this crypto exchanges even though you have those private keys or seeds.

I mean, most Bitcoin/crypto wallets in general have always been centralized; with probably only Bitcoin Core(and probably Electrum?) being actually somewhat decentralized. And it's fine! A centralized wallet can still be a good wallet, as long as it's open-source.

Mpurse for Monacoin and Monaparty + Tokens. Comes from MetaMask, has its own features. Works like Web3 wallet/signs and interacts with dapp pages for the Counterparty derived Monaparty... Works great just w MONA txn. Looks just like MetaMask on Chrome. Monacoin Core v0.20.3 also is based off Bitcoin Core's codebase and not Litecoin's for the first time. Intriguing to say the least since it is a UTXO chain.

So you're only looking a Bitcoin wallet that can be used as extensions and not looking by the safety, open source, non custodial, features etc? You can check Jaxx liberty wallet, but I'm not recommend you to use that wallet since it's not safety and secure, I'm just talking Bitcoin wallet by extensions.

To be honest I don't see any difference between software based and extension based, because extension is way more not secure than the software based. You're need to use hardware wallet if you want to hold for long term purpose or have significant amount of Bitcoin.

Let me categorize the wallets according the how safe they are.

The safest are the cold wallets. Wallets that falls into this category are paper wallet generated on airgapped device. Another cold wallet are the wallets generated on airgapped device. Also hardware wallets can be regraded as cold wallets. Cold wallets are the safest because their private keys are not online and not generated online.

Followed by desktop and mobile wallet. They are still better than web wallets.

Web wallets are most susceptible to attacks. Not worth going for at all.