Bitcoin Forum

Hello,
         I've just come across an old wallet (2017) of mine. Could somebody tell me if this is my secret phrase or seed, crypto_keys-repl.man Thanks in advance  :)

In October 2017 I invested a small amount in bitcoin, then life got in the way, and nothing further happened. I was going through my old laptops (to flog them) and came across my wallet address, put it on Bitcoin block explorer, and yep, that's me, and it was on the same old laptop which I found the files, so I imagine the two are connected.  :)

I dont quite understand what you are asking.  It sounds like you found some file on your computer and you think it might have your bitcoin wallets seed phrase in it? Where did this file come from anyway? Maybe try opening it up in Notepad or something and take a look inside.  Just from a quick google search it looks to me like that file is part of Windows itself, so I kinda doubt it has anything to do with bitcoin wallets or crypto.

It is worth knowing that a seed phrase will consist of 12, 15, 18, 21 or 24 words. It would be good if you explain better what you meant as the wallet that you found. It is an app or a wallet file? Or it consists of words, or starts with characters like xprv, yprv, zprv, 5, K, L or hexadecimal characters?

I don't know the contents of that file, but it's an actual file and can't you remember where did you take that?

I haven't encountered a .man file but it seems this is the description of it.


So whatever is inside of it, you will be the only that shall know it if a seed or phrase is written in that file.

Getting the image here won't be a good advice as it might be your key and if exposed your wallet funds might got stolen, the best advice  is to tell us just the description of the file or anything you're finding hard to understand without copying and pasting word for word... just a simple description will help.
Without this it's might be hard to help...but nevertheless just as @Charles-Tim replied, if it's in those format : some dummy words could be anything might be numbered or just word-spaced  then it's definitely a seed phrase

I never heard of any backup BTC keys that contain or generate a backup key with this extension.

Why not, open it with Notepad++ if it shows 12, 15, 18, 21, or 24 words like the above said then there is a high chance its a seed backup but you need check if all words are in bip39 word list (https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0039/english.txt) but if not then it's not a back key you just found a random file.
If you have any of these files below then that's your BTC wallet.

Cheers, that will be my next move.

It's my first time to know about file with .man extension.

I am not sure it is related to your Bitcoin wallet in 2017 or not but you can read the following guide and try to recover your wallet, if you actually have access to it now.

[overview] Recover Bitcoin from any old storage format (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=4959742.0)

It's turning into a good read, Cheers  :)

If you open that file as text as instructed, you'll see something like this:

The gist is; not every file that's named "crypto" is related to Bitcoin or Cryptocurrency,
In fact, every wallet file or backup format are rarely named with the term "crypto" in it.

My addition to the linked topic is you should enable "show hidden items" when manually searching for wallet files since those usually located in hidden directories like "AppData".

You may also consider using another PC to search and just mount your drive so that it wont have to create unnecessary 'writes' to the disk in case the file that you're looking for are deleted.
That way, you'll have a better chance to restore deleted files intact.
And you should also create a "disk image" (Google it) for backup purposes.

I don't think you, OP, should waste your time investigating this file. Check it. https://www.reddit.com/r/techsupport/comments/3nhlyc/pc_infected_with_cryptowall_virus/?sort=old
All owners of old systems have their reasons for accepting the most ordinary file from the system as the file they would like to see. In this case, the person was looking for a virus. :D

I'm not sure it is indeed a virus (or the traces of one that infected OP's computer). If you read the first reply from that post, the user is mentioning that the file that OP is mentioning here belongs to a collection of files that belong to Windows Cryptography API. This[1] post in the Microsoft forums also suggest that the file is indeed a manifest. I guess that the hopes of finding a seed or secret phrase are confirmed as lost however.

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[1]https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/ask-the-directory-services-team/friday-mail-sack-pew-pew-pew-edition/ba-p/398757 (https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/ask-the-directory-services-team/friday-mail-sack-pew-pew-pew-edition/ba-p/398757)

Where did I write that this is a virus? I clearly wrote that the files belong to the system, most likely Windows, and there is no point in wasting time looking for something that is not there.
The OP remembers buying Bitcoin, so he associates all the words “crypto” with his desire to find Bitcoin many years from now.
But unfortunately, most likely, this will remain only in dreams.

My bad, I misinterpreted your post, I'll edit it. The remaining of what you said still holds up, especially considering that most people will get their hopes up with anything that says "crypto" in their filenames. In this particular case it seems that OP had his hopes settled rather quickly.

Instead of looking inside that file OP you may try to search your whole hard drive for text and images because most people save their seed phrases as text or screenshot image. If you're also like most people then you might have done something like that.

I sincerely hope that most people don't do this as it is a terrible move to save your mnemonic recovery words (seed phrase) on your usually online daily internet device. Nothing hinders malware to search your entire device for such recovery words, once your device becomes infected. Pictures are often synced with picture cloud storage where cloud providers often index such pictures "for convenience". Guess how much you already lost control over your picture files and their content...

Mnemonic recovery words are supposed to be backed up in an analog way, written on paper and maybe later stamped into metal for more fire and water protection (use more corrosion resistant stainless steel or titanium based metal backup; I prefer washers as those aren't associated with crypto backup needs when bought).

There are many things that are not clear in this post. To be clear, you found your wallet which you check on bitcoin explorer and found bitcoin but you do not have the seed phrase. If this be the case, you've got to open the files in your systems in Notepad, as suggested by others, maybe you might be lucky.

This has no connection to bitcoin or seed phrase, just a file extension which you have to open to check if the actual seed phrase is in there. What can also help is if you can remember the wallet you store the bitcoin because if it is blockchain.com, you just have to think about your password and not the seed phrase because with the password, you can still access the wallet.

lovesmayfamily (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5497054.msg64101034#msg64101034) already stated that the file with the name of crypto_keys-repl.man is some kind of virus, as the site link he shared, the author on that site stating he had multiple files with the word crypto in them. So, another person also replied back to him as well, I hope that will help you. But with my own research, I can also say that this file did not contain your seed phrase, as the main term used in the last most likely shows a manifest file that duplicates the encryption keys.

So considering the duplication term I can say, that the key to unlocking that file might be in it, but who knows how to open it, even if you open it how one will decrypt the data in it? I suggest you to check the content of the file try to open in text file, or some other tool, if anything is readable like words then I hope you might find the keys, but chances with this file are lesser.

I also hope that but in real most people do that because they don't care much about their safety as they believe that they are safe as long as they don't install unwanted software. You're right that nothing can stop a malware when it enters someone's device and those who safe their seed phrases as text files or images could end up losing their holding because of their own unawareness.

But, it's quite hard to promote awareness at that level in crypto world. I know those people who are part of this forum are much knowledgeable about privacy and safety of their crypto holdings but the ones who aren't part of this forum or who heard about crypto from their friends, always do something like that.

There are also those people who newly enter the crypto market and who doesn't understand the importance of seed phrases, and private keys, and in hurry they end up not saving those seed phrases and private keys.