Actually some of the Electrum servers also leak information about the addresses in a wallet and their transactions/funds. All the SPV wallets (light wallets that connect to external servers) face, in a way or another, this same problem.

If you want proper privacy, I think that the actual way is a bit more complicated, involving you install Bitcoin Core and download the full blockchain.

I think that in order to import a master public key you may also have to install an Electrum server and use Electrum with your own server. I've done that a few months ago.

That's not unexpected, by far. Keep in mind that any seller risks that until the point he will spend those RUR they will probably worth much less than at the moment of trade.
And obviously the sellers also try to profit greatly...

Um.. not really...
Do you realize that the coins in the cex account are only entries in a database, associated with an account id?
Do you realize that after one deposited coins there, those coins can be spent (by cex) for other users' withdrawals, still his account id keeps track about his current amount of coins?
All the trades done by that account are also part of the same database, linked to the same account id.
So tracing the coins should be easy, no matter they are Bitcoin or USD pegged whatever.

That's why I said the options are limited. The available options are most probably in-country, either face to face, either with the account at the same bank.
Don't rule out completely the option that some Russians may need to sell BTC for fiat (RUR, USD, EUR) for their daily spending.

Gold is difficult to carry with you. Gold is heavy. Gold has to be declared at the border.
One can easily hide with himself one or more copies of his wallet seed, sometimes even in the plain sight and go on. Even a hardware wallet is not a problem at the customs.

Indeed bitcoin can be difficult to spend if electricity / internet is down (although smartphone + power bank can solve the problem if the electricity is not completely wrecked), but I don't know how many would accept gold either, since the risk of receiving counterfeit/something that's not gold is pretty high.

I don't say gold is bad. What I say that neither of the two is perfect.

Avand in vedere ce prezentare s-a facut proiectului.. chiar sunt curios daca cineva de pe sectiunea romaneasca are curajul sa-si incerce norocul...

You do realize that the better/stronger your method is, the better the chance that an accident/stroke/brain damage (which I hope will never happen!) can make the coins unrecoverable by your family, right?
You do realize that in 10 years you may have forgotten the wonder method for securing the seed?
Sorry, no matter how good or bad your method is, you should not use that.

And an advice: it may be better to put that .. key... into a code tag, since now it strangely shows (at least to me) a space character that doesn't actually exist

I see no challenge, really. If one has no technical knowledge a hardware wallet covers most of the security he needs and he can continue by reading a few non-technical things, but not much more.
And a light wallet like Electrum for Desktop or Mycelium for Android don't need 400GB and such, they are pretty straightforward and small.
I think that paper wallets are a (technical) step forward, not for everybody.


Indeed, centralized exchanges are somewhat like banks - in relation to KYC, legislation, sanctions -, but they're even worse actually than banks because:
* in Europe 100k EUR/person/bank is backed by the government; this doesn't happen with exchanges, no matter what their owners say (some may be insured or have a reserve fund, but inside job/theft and sloppy handling can happen)
* an exchange may tell it was hacked, close the business and leave you without your coins; or be hacked for real, with same result
* phishing schemes can steal your money usually easier from an exchange than from a bank
* you can easily mistake your overly complicates security settings at certain exchanges (like believing that 2FA keeps your account safe while your API keys are exposed)
* you can get your phone stolen, having both the 2FA and the exchange's app on the phone.

It's not the first scammer with "wide" and stupid retaliatory feedback. I have my "painting" too, from g.p. and such.

We know that those don't mean anything, but:
* newbies may not know that and may even get a wrong impression about somebody because of this
* lower ranks may be afraid to post real negative feedback because of this

The problem is, on the other hand, that "not regulated" is crystal clear and if admin starts to add exceptions.. he may be opening Pandora's box.
Still... I think that a rule on removing all the trust feedback a banned user does may make sense. In most cases it won't help, still...

Symbolic links are some sort of shortcuts. You put a shortcut in a folder telling that the date is somewhere else. The system will see the data like it's in the original place.
A google result that could explain it better is: https://www.howtogeek.com/howto/16226/complete-guide-to-symbolic-links-symlinks-on-windows-or-linux/

chainstate or indexes are 2 subfolders of your (Bitcoin Core's) data folder. My point was to move the current content of those folders to the SSD and put (on the HDD) symbolic links to point to the new location.

When I've done that myself the speed improvement was significant.

At the end, if you want to have all the data on HDD and move the content back, you'll have to pay attention at removing the symbolic links (you may have to google a little).

That may work if the other party also has and account to the same bank. I think that transfers between Russian banks also needs SWIFT.
But yes, you're right, this may be indeed one use case that doesn't need face to face. (I've added now an update to the other post too)

Use Symbolic links and put the chainstate (and indexes too if you have) onto SSD. You can move them back after the initial sync has reached 100%.
Of course, these operations need Bitcoin Core not be running when you do that.

From what I've understood from here (Romanian, here's a Google translation), if it's out of SWIFT, the customers of the bank can only withdraw money, nothing else. So I expect that - in a way or another - only face to face trades could take place there.

Edit: as seen here (thanks ETFbitcoin  for pointing out), if the other party has account at the same bank, it may work P2P without the need for face-to-face.

Since Russia banks are out of SWIFT, Russians will not be able to transfer their rubles to most of the exchanges, hence I think that they don't have much of other choices than finding other individuals inside Russia willing to sell Bitcoin for RUR.


Bitcoin price has quite a history of going up and down. One needs to have been reading and trusting Bitcoin for long term - the past charts show that for minimum 4 years it was usually a good investment.
But right now? No. One may need to access the money "tomorrow". Also, as I said, it won't be easy to find sellers.
Right now Russians would better exchange their fiat in any other currency. But I think that they've already missed that train too...

PS. Keeping the private keys/seed on an USB stick is unsafe. Paper or steel are better, usually kept in multiple places.

I find it rather strange that Bitcoin Core is not on the list at all.
Also Hardware wallet is not one wallet - there are many brands and models.

While the intention of the post is good, it does need improvements.

Some other notes:
* I would warn people against web wallets - even those that are not custodial
* I would warn people against generating paper wallets online
* I would warn people about open source vs closed source wallets
* I would mention that private key or seed has to be backed up safely offline in multiple places.

The point of having HW is to safely sign transactions. If you don't want to sign transactions, you don't need the HW. As you know, HW works with a companion software wallet after all.
You can import the master public key into any software wallet... As long as master public key is imported, the wallet doesn't have to be connected to the internet (just then you will see addresses, but not the current funds on those addresses).

I feel that you misunderstood something from how Bitcoin works....

I see PoW vs PoS also in a philosophical way: it's meritocracy vs oligarchy.
For PoW one has to work hard and good to obtain rewards and trust.
For PoS the rich ones rule; you have no other choice than just trust them because they've bought that coin.

I know that PoS lovers will come and tell that ASICs can also be bought on big numbers by the rich. Still not the same. PoW is the right direction.
The only thing I'd like to see more is that large ASIC farms start building their own sources of regenerable energy (although I know that the PoW vs Environment drama is fake)

Well pointed out. I feel that this is the main reason for this topic. (PS. You may want to fix your quotes though)


Indeed, the percents are very small. I don't know if it's 5%, however, small. But it doesn't necessarily means they trust banks more, I think it means they don't trust (or simply fear of) bitcoin.
It was said for so long that's unsafe to keep money in Bitcoin, most do follow that.
It also doesn't mean that 95% would keep their money in banks, some don't trust banks and keep fiat at home (which makes them perfect targets for thieves).

The problem is that the money in banks is (at least lately in Europe) even backed by the state (under 100k/person/bank, which is usually enough). So extra trust... until something bad happens (remember that in Iceland everybody lost all their bank deposits in 2008? or just look what happens now in Russia and Ukraine too; even in Romania panic did strike and many ATMs were empty yesterday)


El Salvador is a wonderful example to follow, although afaik most people there too use mainly custodian services.
And Russia... I don't know if I want it declare Bitcoin as legal tender, nor used by their government; it may label it criminals' money and I don't want that.

Somebody's selling cheap. Again.

Thanks for the laughs.


Yep, my vote also goes for Defcon 2. And we're early. China may be next. Although.... how's the queen lately, since she also had/has covid?


Don't celebrate victory yet, the bugger loves to play dead for a short while just to hit in another area. I surely hope it's not the case for you, still, make sure you're prepared (and continue to take medicine if you started doing that).