Easier way to safely store Bitcoins?

[SwannyMatt]

Hello, I'm very interested in Bitcoins and bought a couple a month or so ago. I'm getting more confident in the potential that Bitcoin has and I really want to buy a bunch more. However I'm not completely confident with my security set-up and I'm very confused with the "How to set up a secure offline savings wallet" tutorial.

Can't I just install the client on a USB hard drive with the internet off, unplug the USB after install, then transfer the funds from my Laptop? Obviously it won't be nearly as safe as that insane tutorial linked above but how much less safe can it be? I don't want a Wuala account, bitcoin linux binary, ubuntu, truecrypt, or any extra stuff like that...

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[nobbynobbynoob]

If you have a spare offline computer, the Truecrypt method isn't that bad. Put Truecrypt and the bitaddress.org HTML/Javascript page onto a thumb drive, plug that into the offline system, hash up some keys, copy/paste both the Bitcoin addresses and (nota bene!) their corresponding WIF private keys (beginning with 5) into a text file and save that text file into a Truecrypt volume (don't forget the passphrase!). Then delete all the private-key references from the text file, leaving just the public addresses listed and then Save As... a new file on the thumb drive. Not the most convenient thing to do but a reasonable way to create a cold wallet that doesn't require a PhD.

I happen to have selected this method but it's not the only way. That tutorial thread's pretty good.

[DannyHamilton]

You have to decide for yourself how much risk you are willing to take.

The larger the amount of bitcoin you are holding, the more devastating the potential loss if they are stolen or you loose them.

If you are comfortable that your online computer will not get hacked, and will not get a virus or trojan software, then you can use your online computer to store your bitcoins.  Personally, I'm wouldn't be that confident that some security flaw won't allow someone to steal my bitcoins if I was storing access to a lot of them on my online computer.

An offline USB is not a bad way to go.  You'll want to make sure that you have reliable backups of the wallet on that USB, because if you lose it or it gets accidentally destroyed, or it fails you'll lose all access to those bitcoins.  Also, if your computer is already compromised, it is possible (though pretty unlikely) that some malicious software could be recording what you are doing while you are offline and could then report the wallet private keys when you put the computer back online.

You need to consider 2 parts of securing your bitcoin collection:

1. Theft.  You need to make certain that you are comfortable that nobody will gain access to the private keys that are stored in the wallet.  If they do, they can spend your bitcoins.

2. Loss.  You need to make sure that when you decide to spend some of those bitcoins you can still access the private keys.  If you can't then you can never spend your bitcoins.

[nobbynobbynoob]

You need to consider 2 parts of securing your bitcoin collection:

1. Theft.  You need to make certain that you are comfortable that nobody will gain access to the private keys that are stored in the wallet.  If they do, they can spend your bitcoins.

2. Loss.  You need to make sure that when you decide to spend some of those bitcoins you can still access the private keys.  If you can't then you can never spend your bitcoins.

Absolutely, and I think it is crucial that, while both above risks are utterly real, we take stock of things measuredly and proportionately and remember that (IMO) of the above risks for the proverbial average joe/jane, number two is the far greater risk. Careless reformats, hard drives crashing and no backups...

[Stephen Gornick]

Hello, I'm very interested in Bitcoins and bought a couple a month or so ago. I'm getting more confident in the potential that Bitcoin has and I really want to buy a bunch more. However I'm not completely confident with my security set-up

If your USB drive is a LiveOS (e.g., Ubuntu), then use that and copy copy of the html from BitAddress.org 

Then disconnect internet and boot to the LiveOS and load the html.

Print a few pages of paper wallets.  Print 2 copies of each.

Reboot.

Fund each with sane amounts (e.g., no more than 25 BTC each).

Store one copy in a secure location.  Store a second copy in another secure location or give to a loved one to hold on for you.

When you want to spend, from a secure computer (or using the LiveOS but connected to the internet), grab one of the paper wallets and redeem on Blockchain.info/wallet (import private key).  Done.

If you are talking more significant amounts of funds, there are additional approaches:
 - http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=123727.msg1331697#msg1331697

[navyjeff]

You could setup a wallet on https://blockchain.info/wallet/. They allow you to backup and store your bitcoins several different ways. There's even a good demo system.

[Kazimir]

Personally, I just use an Ubuntu Live USB flash drive, in which all network cards and connections have been disabled or removed. So when I boot from that, I have a dedicated, offline, safe Ubuntu environment without the need of a separate PC.

Created some private keys (in the offline Ubuntu), stored them in a truecrypt archive (although just an encrypted archive would also do, with any archive format that supports AES, for example 7-zip) and backed that up at several places. Online, offline and on paper. I stored the public addresses in a separate file, imported them as watch-only in a blockchain wallet, so now I can see my funds there, without ever exposing my private keys in any way.

I only use this for my savings, my spending amount isn't that much and I just keep that in a regular blockchain wallet and a local wallet (MultiBit).

Whenever I want to transfer funds out of my savings to my spending account, I use a script as discussed here to create transactions offline.

I agree it's not the most convenient way of doing things, but then again, I only needed to set this up once (no need to keep making any backups later on, just created a bunch of keys right away). Plus I only need to boot the USB flash drive whenever I need to move coins from my savings to my spending wallet. And it's absolutely, positively, most definitely EXTREMELY secure (up to the level of paranoia), which makes me sleep better