Bitcoin Forum

There is a post floating around suggesting to newbies to use an online wallet service. I completely am against any online wallet services as of now. I suggest to use either the LinuxCoin A lightweight Debian based OS with everything ready to go. (http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=7374.0) or HOWTO: create a 100% secure wallet (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=17240.0) to keep your investment/BTC safe from getting stolen or lost.

Examples in why we should not use online wallet services.

MyBitcoin.com, where did it go? (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=32984.0)

MyBitcoin stole 2 bitcoins from me (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=32807.0)

Mybitcoin is a scam! (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=26224.0)

mybitcoin down or just me? (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=32900.0)

MyBitcoin.com - hosting provider: leaseweb.com (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=33020.0;topicseen)

Lucky for me, I just pulled out of mybitcoin a few days ago with a few BTC using HOWTO: create a 100% secure wallet (https://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=17240.0) to keep my wallet safe.

Check out http://www.bitprotection.info  also :)

edit: if you are going to accuse us of being scammers please provide evidence -   we provide a service for a real problem and that is people erasing/lost wallets which happens a lot more then you know!

No offense. I don't think so, my opinion that is.

The other option is that we provide 100% secure off-line vault for your wallet. All you need to do is send us a copy of your wallet.dat on a USB stick into the mail and we will lock it into our secure vault.

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

Suggesting to newbies not to use online wallets will stop a lot of potential users getting onto the bitcoin train.

I agree that, at the moment, online wallet services are semi-professional beta-services at best and you should definitely not trust large amounts of bitcoins to them.

But no matter what you may think, online wallets will be the primary means of using bitcoins in the future. Just as webmail services are the primary means of using email.

Therefore, i'd rather encourage people to use one or even several of the more trusted online wallets. That will only help them to get better.

Why should anyone trust your site?
- Who are you? You have no name, phone number or contact address on your site
- your "Contact Us" form redirects to some third party site
- your official email address for the site is a @Gmail.com address

Reading your older postings in this forum, that you made with varying nicknames (Haydenwaves/bitprotection), i can only label you as scammer or troll.

http://forum.bitcoin.org/index.php?topic=19506.0

How can one recommend a service which he is not already using for some time?

If we recomend new users online wallet services, they will use it (and potentially lose money) no matter what.
If we recomend them regular clients, they will use the client (and potentially lose money) no matter what.

Later when they can decide what services they can trust, they can switch to online wallets...


bitprotection.info?
I would not trust with even a satoshi to service like this :D

No offense taken! :)

Glad to you think its funny!  ?? 

 "Who are you? You have no name, phone number or contact address on your site"  Ok  will do and this will change your mind how ?

 "your "Contact Us" form redirects to some third party site"  Ok? we use jotform ? and your point ?

 "your official email address for the site is a @Gmail.com address " Ok ? we'll make a info@bitprotection.info ?

anything else?

Actually it's a scam.

Online wallets. Lol.

Provide evidence please of this "scam" ....I didn't think so..

I don't get it. Care to explain?

- stop spamming
- *.info domains are usually used for malware, trojans, spam and scam
- i hope you are a troll  ;D

-Suggesting isn't spamming
-plenty of .info sites around here so there all scams? please provide evidence we've scammed anyone?

And I hope you aren't as stupid as you sound :)

Online wallets are most likely the best way to get Bitcoins widely accepted!

However, the operator/s of an online wallet service must be trustworthy. Such a service must be transparent, it should have a real address with an office and it shouldn't be run from the basement of some anonymous guy's(who spams the forum with a link to his site in nearly every post he makes) house with a Gmail account as only contact option.

"Send me your wallet.dat to iwillkeepyourcoinzsave@yahoo.com . I won't steal it, i promise!" ....sounds very trustworthy.

Sry OP, maybe you have good intentions...but your site and comments don't look like it.

If you actually look at my other posts in this forum you'll notice me participating. Also, you clearly don't understand the service we can't do anything with your wallet as then people would just produce a claim around it - it isn't just give "me " your wallet. Clearly, there has to be some trust I know that but to accuse some if scam with no evidence shows you aren't to credible with anything your saying. Sorry to say it .

I don't buy this one bit. IMHO it is foolish and dangerous to make such an assertion.

If one is not smart enough to have their wallet securely on two usb sticks (one is backup) one should *run* away from bitcoin.

Linuxcoin works and works very well. If you really do not have the time or expertise to set one up PM me and I will either walk you through it or sell you one already set up (minus the actual wallet file which will be generated the first time you use it, or if you like with an existing wallet with mature coins that you can use right away with no fees, HINT use the first option).

I fully agree with "Online wallets. Lol." Only I would add "!!!"

Online wallet is a joke....lol just make a whole bunch of trahill, mtgox accounts....lol

Of course it does work well. But you are also a geek. Try to explain that to a none-geek:
"LinuxCoin? What's an .iso file? how do i burn it to cd? how do i create a bootable usb stick? WTF, i have to reboot my pc nao? Why the fuck do i have to download several hundred MB for that stupid Blockchain? What is that anyway? How do i get coins now? What's mining? What's an exchange? How do i use it? What, i need dwolla or LibertyReverse first?"
If you can quickly guide none-geek users through this, so that they actually understand it, let me know how.
Average Joe will just say "fuck this, to complicated. I'll just sign up at paypal that's what they use on ebay anyway". As long as Bitcoins aren't as easy to use like paypal, it will be stigmatized as hacker and geek currency.
Online wallets/Paypal like platforms can help to get Bitcoins widely acceptable and easily useable for average internet users and also for smartphone users.
Such a platform however, as already said, must be run by a trustworhty professional organization that is liable and has a real office and not by some random anonyous guy. Your real bank account is not much different to that.
I'm not saying that you, as a geek, should use it. I'm just saying a trustworthy online wallet service can help gaining acceptance ammong the average internet users.

Don't use online wallets, ever.

Yes, LinuxCoin is too geek, but you don't need using LinuxCoin to maintain your wallet in your HD.

I believe that banks (real ones) or a big Internet company like PayPal would be interested in it if the number of people using Bitcoin grows.

I could not imagine what is going through the persons head that might have lost all of their bitcoins, due to this problem.

Some people say, "Don't even trust your own computer!"

Other people say, "Online wallets FTW!  What, me worry?"

It seems to me that keeping at least two copies of one's wallet.dat files, strongly-encrypted, on two separate USB drives or CDs/DVDs is the way to go for now,
maybe even renaming them and changing the file extension while they are stored away, only moving them to the Bitcoin datadir when one is using the client.

I love the simplicity of everything being in that one .dat file, but that also seems to be its biggest flaw\vulnerability.

Hopefully, Bitcoin will evolve and become more secure, or it will succumb to increasingly more scammin' bastards.

I agree.

Are you spying on me :o?

Ima look for those camera's. ;D

Title fix'd.

What is stopping other services like mybitcoin, happening to them as what happened to mybitcoin?

NOTHING is stopping other "services" from doing what MyBitcoin has done.
A person really needs to be responsible for their own wallet and security habits, instead of trusting one of these fly-by-night online wallet scams.
At least until the Bitcoin client (hopefully) addresses wallet security in a future version.
I'm sure more MyBitcoins will crawl out of the woodwork, looking to earn your trust.

Caveat emptor.  Abundans cautela non nocet.

Anyone thinking of developing or using an online wallet service should be thinking about offline reserves, as discussed here: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=34011.0

I think at this point its fair to say you shouldnt trust your coins
to ANY third party

The reality is that Bitcoin will never get mainstream adoption without easy to use online wallets.

Obviously there is a trust issue in the market now but nothing that the market can't solve going forward.

And we have another problem with the mainstream adoption. When I pay to another address some coins, that transaction may take at least 10 minutes to get over.

Online wallets must also resolve this issue.

That's where green wallets kick in i.e. the online wallets send their payments via one of their central wallets so people know (from experience, reputation) that the payment is real even if it still needs to get confirmed.

BitFlow = another MyBitcoin?

i still think the safest place for your wallet is in your personal computer, that only you have access to.

BitFlow will be an exchange. I'd also appreciate it if you don't compare us with a scam outfit.

U Mad Bro?

In case you haven't noticed, anyone that shows up on these boards claiming to keep others BTC safe with their site MyUberSafeWalletTown.org or whatshisname raises red flags (or should) for most people, myself included. 
You know, since it's an untraceable anarchocryptocurrency and all.  Too easily exploited at this juncture, my man, by people who want to earn just the minimum amount of trust needed to take the money and run. 
Your site looks like a half-assed template, it's hosted by GoDaddy, and the email is a Gmail account.  Plus you're wearing an argyle sweater vest and tooling around in your dinghy.
Red flags to me, chief.

Being an exchange doesn't necessarily mean better, look at bitomat.pl... they "lost" their wallet :D

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=33457.0

Make sure you have a good firewall, (although I'm not a paranoid user).

I wasn't making claims about BitFlow specifically in this thread. Just pointing out someone will need to offer a safe, trusted wallet solution.

The production site isn't live yet. What you see now at bitflow.org is just a standard page by unbouncepages.com.

The production site will be hosted by AWS.

Let's keep this thread about the need (or not) for a good wallet solution going forward.

Online wallet services are needed for instant transactions, but one should only keep the amount they are using in near future on one.

Main savings should be kept on multiple off-line adresses, with minium of one copy, maybe one on paper, so even if someone gets very very very... very lucky only portition is lost.
Key points of security:
1. Keep the 1000s off-line with certainly safe address.
2. Split it up if possible...
3. Make copies, USB sticks might die on you...

The use I see for online wallets is to put some coins in them when trading person to person IRL.  I see it as putting cash in your pocket.

Then you don't understand wallets yet.

I can send you a payment weather or not your wallet is online or offline.

All I need is a valid address to send it to.

Bump as a reminder to the new comers.

lol ^

reminds me of CASH 4 GOLD!

Bumped.