Bitcoin Forum

question about physical bitcoins:

do you ever came across a theft case where thief stole the victims all bitcoins. like in physical world many banks robbed by robbers.

If bitcoin can be robbed like banks or any type of robbery, how can we be safe with this like more tips for security excluding writing key phrase on paper, etc.

what type of safety a individual should take to protect bitcoins physically like cascusious coins.

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violence terms:
question about physical and digital bitcoins:

If the thief killed the owner of bitcoin and started finding wallet keys in his home (in most of the cases people store their private keys and phrases in home) and found that keys and stole all coins.

to stay safe what type of security a person should follow, like telling about bitcoins to next owner(wife, son, etc) after the original owner(like we do in preparing will) has been passed away, or keeping phrases in different places and telling to most trusted family members, buying cascusious coins not for storing large amount of coins, etc.

EDIT:
1. never tell anyone that you own bitcoins

You have to trust the company which launch their collectible coins but is trusting any third-party is a good idea to start with?

Bitcoin with its technology, private keys, mnemonic seeds give us a perfect chance to have our own bank and we don't have to trust any third-party to secure our coins. Now, you want to take risk and bet that your trust will not be betrayed by any third-party company or any middle man.

Trust no one in Bitcoin (Coldkey story) (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5434573.0).

If you trust, you can end like people who trust Yogg and his works.

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Another important point is "Keep your mouth shut off as much as possible". It's to keep your secret that nobody or limited people can know that you are a bitcoin investor".
If you are always talkative and tell everyone around you that you have bitcoins and how you store your bitcoins, like I bring my coins around with my phone, tablets, usb, hardware wallet, you can be robbed on road or similar.

First, we are always advised to keep our hoarding out of the ears and eyes of others. When more than one person knows that you are holding Bitcoin or any other coin, it will attract the attention of thief's to attack your home. In this crypto industry, we are always advised to remain anonymous, irrespective of who you are.

I have read a story either on this forum or on the internet where a crypto whale—I don't actually know the exact number he was holding—was attacked by people who discarded themselves in the form of an official, and one of his mistakes was having his entire crypto wallet and its access on his mobile device, which the criminals forced him to open, and the entire funds were stolen. I don't know the entire story, but it's a case of someone who made his holding open, which attracted the attention of many who targeted him.

On the other hand, there are a lot of ways to save our private keys and phrases, even if they are written down on a piece of paper or an entire handbook. There are also possible ways of hiding them, and if it's not someone who you have told or shown that something like that is hidden in a place of such importance, no one will ever think of that.

We are our top security officer for our holding, and we should always be cautious, from being private to physical protection.

Don't declare to the world that you are actually holding bitcoins physical or not. I mean there is a wrong perception out there that you are somewhat rich if you own btc or other cryptocurrencies so being private about it will reduce the risk of robbery or theft.

I'm not a fan of this since there's still that risk that relatives could take advantage but to each his own. There are also some third party projects that are into crypto safekeeping in case something happens to you but I'm not too familiar with them.

This is like trying to predict the future, for now writing my passphrase in a paper or book is safe and I don't have to walk around my city and start telling everyone that I have Bitcoin in my wallet, right now mamy people still don't know what Bitcoin does and some don't want to get involved with Bitcoin, before we start seeing many Bitcoin hunters going after people there will be better solutions and one of them is a hardware wallet.

Criminals will always be criminals you know, no matter what gou try, if you keep your mouth shut you won't attract criminals in your local area, the real reason why armed robbers come to most homes is because someone gave the victim up. And sometimes, it's always an inside job, so it's very important to be secretive when you are holding something as valuable as Bitcoin.

In terms of physical Bitcoins and particularly Bitcoin in the form of collectibles like Casascius
coins as the OP mentioned. It has happened recently with the ColdCard products where the
maker kept alot of the private keys to the funded cards he sold, the thread is here for anyone
looking to find out > https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5434506.0

Unfortunately this sort of thing throws a question mark over the idea of letting someone else
fund coins with your own Bitcoin.

Like anything keeping your personal items safe and secure is important because there are people
out there who just cannot be trusted. This includes keeping the private key safe and secure.
There have been many threads about this topic...

Stainless steel Bitcoin Recovery Seed Plate (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5323755.0)

Recommendations to store my seed phrase!! (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5448461.0)

You might not have come across the stories but yep there have been the cases where individuals were robbed physically for the bitcoin.

There are more than 100 cases of such robbery, harassment or by any force meant at the time. These were literally done at someone's home, at coffee shop, public places or even with gang forces.

You wouldn't belive the ways people have used to rob someone for their bitcoins.

1. By drugging  (https://archive.is/ezAnH)
2. Fake workers (https://archive.fo/kabJg)
3. Seducing (https://archive.ph/e6FKx)
4. Gang forces (https://archive.is/GP76C)
5. Beating  (https://archive.is/OnZVR)
6. Knifepoint (https://archive.is/CeCA8)
7. Kidnapping and ransom  (https://archive.ph/KrFtE)
8. .........
there are literally N-number of ways people have done these acts. The stories are terrifying. Most of them were also shot dead, hammered to death, tied and tortured.

Yes, these things are happening and bitcoin can be stolen in physical ways. So be safe, do not reveal much in the public. It's better that way.

If you are interested in reading more stories then you can refer to the following article which has been published on the GitHub.

Physical Bitcoin Attacks (https://github.com/jlopp/physical-bitcoin-attacks#known-physical-bitcoin-attacks)

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Want safety?
I think it's better to keep oneself from talking much about the bitcoin in the nearby vicinity and trading bitcoin too openly. It is entirely fine if you are just doing small trades and not exposing how much you have in bitcoin (for example, millions!)

I think in similar way we protect the fiats, same goes for the Bitcoin as well.

100% safe? There is no such thing!

After all Bitcoin or in this case the access to the coins, be it a wallet, a seed phrase, or an encrypted file is still a property that they can get to it or force you to give up, It's a thing of determination and what kind of thieves are you dealing with!
Are you getting mugged in the street and the thief runs with your phone? Simple encryption would help, then you rush home and use your back-up to move the coins to a safe new address! You have 1000BTC, a gang has found that out, and they are ready to kidnap and torture you? Then, just like any other of your possessions, there is no way of keeping them safe. They will torture you till you give them the keys or they will lose patience and shoot you!
Basically, it's almost the same as other valuables, it's easier to hide from a casual burglar, and you can hide the keys far easier than a 10 square feet painting or a 1 ton of sculpture but if we talk about ransom, that's it.

Probably the best method is to keep your holdings secret, avoid KYC on shady websites so a database leak won't show the whole world your balance and home address, avoid talking and bragging about Bitcoin on social media, and so on, in short, use common sense!

There are some incidents of robbery that happen in the bank or to individuals, and after some sort of investigation, it's usually confirmed that there was an insider who released information to the robbers before they could succeed in their robbery attack.

So, the fact that Bitcoin is digital currency is an advantage because no one around you is going to know you are holding any Bitcoin unless you are the one telling them you own Bitcoin. By the way, you can't just marry today and begin to tell your wife you have some Bitcoins, or your children when they are not really up to the age they should know some things.

The truth is that no one can tell the future, but that doesn't mean that when you are very healthy, you should begin to tell your friends or relatives about all your assets or holdings. There are ways of writing a crypto will without even mentioning it to your family until the right time, say when you are 65 years old and above. You can then tell your family a few things about your holdings, and you can also keep some trace so they can easily recover your assets when you are no more.

The safest thing to do is prevent anyone knows you have some BTC. Stop posting on facebook about how much BTC you have or even just reposting crypto news in your feed.

Any robber who sees it, will believe you have some BTC. Trying to get you private key by holding you or your wife or kid at gunpoint is frightening. You will give up your BTC saving to save life.

You can take essential steps to protect yourself from undesired attention, like not sharing your financial routine and habits with people outside your most intimate circle. Don't tell strangers or people you don't know very well about your personal experience with Bitcoin, if you are concerned about the safety aspect. We never know what the intentions of strangers can be. If you aren't a visible target, 80% of the threat is already under control.

All the rest you can do is to protect your keys carefully and to avoid letting BTCs idle on online platforms where you can't have access to your money with assurance. So you completely nuke the threat of being robbed virtually (that is the main risk when dealing with Bitcoin).

The chances of being physically robbed are really low...

Pretty common question. Robbing of bitcoins are sensationalized by the media, and well of course because it's a billion dollar industry.

Most of the time, robbing only happens when you provide the perpetrator with access to your stuff. Something along the lines of private keys, seed phrases. Once the hacker/thief gets this, it's over for your coins.
In the case of centralized exchanges, they are usually stored in a concentrated place, so once the hacker gets access to this, millions of bitcoins will be up for grabs to them. Just like what always happens to Binance, at least annually (lmao).

So how do you protect yourself from getting hacked and getting your bitcoin stolen from you?

• Not your keys, not your coins: If you depend the safekeeping of your bitcoin to someone else, say a centralized exchange, be ready to say goodbye to it anytime as  hackers could steal it from you, but the most detrimental thing that could happen is a bank run, which is what happened to FTX last year.
• Invest in your own security: Don't cheap out on securing your crypto, especially if it's a substantial amount. Buy a cold wallet, secure it, and only transact exact amounts whenever you're purchasing something using your bitcoin

I have seen bitcoins stolen. Many scammers have stolen bitcoins. There are also many wallets that have very low security. Many times scammers hack unsecured wallets and steal bitcoins. However, Bitcoin users must be careful with their technology systems. Most bitcoin users don't know which wallets are good for bitcoins. And using any technology will keep Bitcoin safe. Our biggest problem is giving access to all our stuff when doing Bitcoin transactions. And add many fake tokens to our wallet.

I like what you did advice there to share it to your family but only to your trusted family member. I mean it is very risky to share it to those only because they are family. use a paper wallets, paper wallets are a form of cold storage that allow you to store your private keys on a piece of paper. These wallets are not connected to the internet and can be kept in a safe place. I think you can also invest to the outside the world investment like stock, bonds, real estate and ETFs / mutual funds. Also avoid posting about your earnings and how much do you have in your wallet.

 

A smart idea is to avoid flaunting your wealth and means of making money online (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5415328.msg61028902#msg61028902), since this can be harmful.
Thieves will go to any length to achieve their goals. I learned about a kidnapping that occurred to a close relative who was kidnapped and plundered of his wealth.  He was often bragging about his wealth online, so the kidnappers took advantage of that and took him to a hidden location where he was forced to sell his assets and transfer the money as fiat to them through another victim's bank account.



It is uncommon, but it does not rule out the possibility. People will go to any length to secure what they value the most. If you have a significant amount of bitcoin that can entice robbers to steal from you, you must have taken the greatest security measures to keep your bitcoins safe and out of reach of anyone.

Allowing your family members to know about your seed phrase is a good idea; after all, the riches belongs to all of you. And you may tell who to trust and who not to trust with your seed phrase when it comes to keeping it safe and accessible only after your death.

This is why buying a loaded physical bitcoin is a bad idea because you never know if the creator saves private key or not and it all comes to trusting them that will not save the key. I knew casascius is the oldest physical bitcoin in the market right now with loaded Bitcoin on it. I think it’s the top contender for the safest physical bitcoin due to its age but still we never know if the key copy of the owner is deleted. It requires time to guarantee the safety.

So why we need to undergo with this trust issue for so long if we can be safe owning physical Bitcoin by doing a DIY.


You already got the best answer with this which is never tell anyone that you own bitcoins. Bitcoin has no physical form so no one will rob you Bitcoin if they didn’t know that you possess it since not everyone holds it in regular basis.

Bitcoin is the only investment that is to be kept secrete because if you have 2000 nobody will know if you are not the loud type. Keeping your mouth shut will prevent you from robbers,since it is only you that know that you have an investment in bitcoin. Privacy is the motto of bitcoin and it should be kept so.

When you are the talking or bragging type,this is when you have expose yourself to robbers. If the robbers are desperate and you don't want to give them access to your bitcoin, you will be killed and your bitcoin gone forever. It is better when you find yourself in this kind of no going back situation,it is advisable that you give them whatever the robber wants to be safe. As long as you are alive you will purchase more bitcoin, it the same thing with you been robbed of your fiat money. Don't ever tell anyone you own bitcoin,also don't use centralized system for anything related to Bitcoin. Beware of malware and links sent to you on the internet.

People have their own way of securing their phrase key.  For example, you can come up with a formula in which you can randomize your key phrase and only you can decrypt it.  Also, you can add random words in it and create another formula which will allow you to remove those unnecessary words from that decrypted key phrase.  That way no robbers can ever use your key even if they got the paper in which you have written the phrase key.

I have come up with a formula which includes Fibonacci sequence and some mathematical formulas to find the correct words for your wallet in that random word list.

This can not give you the safety from a robber, but for the next owner (as you describe wife son or close one) can get the access back to that wallet. And for more security purposes, you can hide those phrase key in a secure place where the robbers won't be able to find it..  
Also, a smart move is to you create another wallet and keep that in places where the robbers won't be able to find it easily and take it. In most of the cases, they are not going to check that wallet right away. Even if they do so, for extra safety measurement, you can always keep a little amount of Bitcoin in it.
This is just to make them confuse.  And yes, people can only know you own Bitcoin only if you tell them.  Or in some situations, find it by chance or by searching for it.  So yeah, never tell anyone that you own Bitcoin.

Then are you going to clearly say and show your investments in other assets to anyone?
Bitcoin is money, as well as an investment asset, that's not the only thing, so you should also keep everything that has high selling value secret and not tell anyone you don't know.

The point is, every investment comes with risk, and no way is 100% safe without risk. We can minimize the risk, and some of the best methods are not telling anyone the amount of assets you own.

Physical Bitcoin? It's important to consider how you would protect your fiat money if such a thing existed, so the same way you have to follow to protect your physical Bitcoin as well. However, since it doesn't exist, it's difficult to imagine. As you accumulate wealth, you'll learn how to protect it. When it comes to real Bitcoin, we all know that securing our seed phrase and private keys is crucial. Additionally, we must prioritize our privacy and consider using a hardware wallet that can be stored in a secure location.

This is another level of theft of the highest order, coming into one's house and asking for private keys is another degree of fraudulent act. I know some people have lost their coins through fake websites and transactions online that are not safe but the example you gave is one in a million. One just has to be careful about where and when you blab about Bitcoin.

There's the popular $5 wrench attack. --> https://www.financemagnates.com/terms/5/5-wrench-attack/

And people will do this to you physically if you've been too vocal that you own cryptocurrencies. It's better to say that you've got nothing in person and you're just too optimistic about this tech.

Being lowkey today pays off than being too vocal and boastful to random stranger and even to the people that you know personally. You will never know the intentions that they've got, if it's going to be clear or pure evil unto you.

A hardware wallet is more than enough if you lead an ordinary lifestyle and never flaunt your wealth or share on social media that you have a significant amount of BTC. Essentially, avoid arousing suspicions in others about your ownership of Bitcoin. The less attention you draw, the less likely others will interfere with your assets.

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I once considered using a bank's services to pass on my digital assets as inheritance. When my digital assets become substantial enough to be considered as part of my estate, I will inform my family about them. Then, I will use the bank's services to secure my digital data.

I will make sure that the bank is not allowed to disclose my important data to my family while I am still alive. However, the bank will never know what kind of data I am storing. Only my family members who know the type of data I am keeping will receive it when I die.

It’s hard to imagine physical bitcoin, Fiat is physical that’s understandable. it is centralized an under the control of the government of the country that owns it.

Bitcoin on the other hand is decentralized not owned by anyone, the supply is limited to 21 million bitcoins, there can never be more production of bitcoin to the 21million.

So Fiat is giving out my banks, if Bitcoin becomes physical who would be in charge of disbursing it out to the public? It just doesn’t add up.

So in addition to the normal way of protecting your bitcoin wallet or portfolio. I would add that another great way is remaining anonymous, you don’t necessarily need to announce yourself(real identity) as a bitcoin holder.

2. You shouldnt really be that boastful about your holdings
3. Always be lowkey
4. Dont make yourself that too obvious that you are dealing with cryptocurrency
5. Just be cautious around just like onto those typical normal days

I myself had been having that kind of paranoid mode when it comes to safety considering that people do able to see out that my life status had progressed much specially into my neighbors.
It cant really be that denied that there would really be envy or something like this on which it could possibly be ending up on some desperate measure which it might be leading up
to some abduction or something like this which we know that it would really be that just a normal approach on having this way. You cant really be able to
be that confident whether you are dealing with fiat or BTC because criminals are just lurking in the shadows.

Those who remain anonymous and do not publicize their Bitcoin holdings are usually very concerned about their own safety, because it will involve disclosing personal identity.

But when an influencer has a lot of followers and has a lot of Bitcoin in his wallet, it will become a target for criminals to be able to take full control of his Bitcoin.

As in the case of the robbery of tourists in Bali Indonesia which also often occurs. The criminals target people who are already famous and have a lot of Bitcoin.
The criminals work in groups and target someone then hold them hostage and blackmail them into sending all the bitcoins to their wallets (criminals).

A few months ago Yuri Boytsov, an investment blogger, was robbed by several criminals of a total of $248k in bitcoins.
This was the umpteenth case, but the police managed to catch the perpetrators.

Security becomes very important when many people already know our Bitcoin holdings.

https://www.cnbcindonesia.com/tech/20230301120225-37-417919/miliarder-bitcoin-rusia-dirampok-di-bali-rp-43-miliar-raib

I'm sure if that person were a bitcoin investor, he would have hidden the wallet key in a place no one else would even suspect his family because the wallet key is everything in investing in bitcoin. So even if a thief kills a bitcoin thief, he may not be able to find the keys to his wallet easily.

And the owner of the bitcoin will also leave a will somewhere where his family members can find it and explain how to use it so he can continue what he was doing.

And I agree with the edit by @OP to never tell anyone we own bitcoins. We will never know who is the person who will intend evil against us. We can only ensure that our bitcoins are safe.

Do you think your wife, son and your most trusted family members aren't live in the same house where you live? :P

Yes you can share your private key on the family away from your house, but you should need to remember if it's will increase your coins will gone since you're trusting your wallet with many people. This mean, you have many way to choose to safeguard your Bitcoin and to pass it.

Either you get scammed by your family, the criminal rob your coins etc.

Yeah, you know that these days where everyone would think of you as wealthy when you mentioned that you're just hodling Bitcoin without specifying how many. People gotta admit that they wanted to brag sometimes, but at least brag it to the right people. Strangers don't give a shit on how much you hold and that's either a bad thing or a good thing for you depending on the outcome.

Hell,  I don't even mention to some of my family members that I do hold Bitcoin. Good thing there ain't $5 wrench attack happening in our family lately, lol.

This kinda depends on how much you really trust your family members though. I do trust some family members, but not to the point that I am willing to give them away money. Even though here in Asia, there is a toxic (kinda) culture where breadwinners kinda gets broke due to being family-oriented even when it comes to money.