Setting up a cold storage for bitcoins

[YIz]

Okay so I have installed Windows 10 from a USB drive and then Bitcoin Core 0.13.0 from bitcoin.org after verifying the digital signature. Backed up the wallet.dat and the private key I extracted using dumpprivkey on several external USB hard drives. I think this setup should be relatively safe, because the private key has never touched the internet.

One of the issues I'm experiencing is the WiFi driver getting automatically installed after I uninstall it using the device manager, so I just disabled it for now. I hope it's good enough.

Do you guys have any additional advice? and how should I spend the bitcoins when the time comes? import them to an online wallet such as blockchain.info or simply sync the blockchain with bitcoin core?

Thanks for all the answers.

I recommend that you don't use any online wallets, regardless. If you don't want to wait for the blockchain to download, then use an SPV wallet like Electrum.

Okay I will not use blockchain for spending the bitcoins then. is Electrum really that much more secure than it?

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[ranochigo]

Okay so I have installed Windows 10 from a USB drive and then Bitcoin Core 0.13.0 from bitcoin.org after verifying the digital signature. Backed up the wallet.dat and the private key I extracted using dumpprivkey on several external USB hard drives. I think this setup should be relatively safe, because the private key has never touched the internet.

One of the issues I'm experiencing is the WiFi driver getting automatically installed after I uninstall it using the device manager, so I just disabled it for now. I hope it's good enough.

Do you guys have any additional advice? and how should I spend the bitcoins when the time comes? import them to an online wallet such as blockchain.info or simply sync the blockchain with bitcoin core?

Thanks for all the answers.

I recommend that you don't use any online wallets, regardless. If you don't want to wait for the blockchain to download, then use an SPV wallet like Electrum.

Okay I will not use blockchain for spending the bitcoins then. is Electrum really that much more secure than it?

Electrum, as with most or all SPV wallets can compromise privacy since it leaks the addresses to the nodes the client connects to. Electrum is safer than Blockchain.info simply because Blockchain.info transfers the private key to their server and Electrum does not. You can use Electrum/Bitcoin Core offline by crafting an unsigned transaction, transfer it to the wallet to sign and broadcast it to the network
As a mentioned above, you can sign the transaction on the offline computer before broadcasting it. For Bitcoin Core, the steps are of below:

1. Go to coinb.in and go to New>Transaction, input all the relevant information. Make sure you include an additional address/your origin address in your wallet to send the change to. Otherwise, the rest of the coins that are unspent will be used as fees.
2. An unsigned hex transaction will be generated, go to Help>Debug Window> Console and use "decoderawtransaction [insert unsigned TX here] to inspect if everything checks out.
3. Next, use "signrawtransaction [unsigned TX here]" to sign it. You can then copy the signed TX and go to coinb.in/#broadcast to broadcast it.

Isn't the most perfect way but I found this the most userfriendly.
For Electrum, look at this: http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/coldstorage.html.

[mjor200]

Another safe way to track if you have a malware is to have a lot of sloppy wallets with few cents in them.Add these wallets to your blockchain.info wallet as watch only.Keep monitoring them and if the balance changes in any of them you will know that someone is snoppy around your system looking for bitcoins.

[Dabs]

I don't really trust paper to keep the private key readable for years.

You do know, well taken cared of books are hundreds of years old. Take care of your "declaration of independence" from banks, and it too, will last hundreds of years.

[Shockaftermoon]

Why not just buy a Ledger Nano S for $65 do you dislike hardware wallets for some reason?

seems like easy/cheap opion.my choice at fact

[BeginnerCoin]

We don't want to have anything to add other than the fact that we have been doing research on cold wallets and this thread has been very useful.

We've documented a few of the ideas for our own use. Thanks kindly everyone.

[bitdumper]

I have seen many of the bitcoin core wallet users complaining about their wallets that they are getting hard times with their laptop. They need to acess the wallet like a bank account but it is more capable of it

[YIz]

We don't want to have anything to add other than the fact that we have been doing research on cold wallets and this thread has been very useful.

We've documented a few of the ideas for our own use. Thanks kindly everyone.

You're welcome, I wasn't able to find much technical information before I started this one. and I have another question: I was thinking about adding an encryption layer to my backups. what program would you guys recommend me to use? VeraCrypt is one of the more popular programs but I'm not sure if it's the best for this use. I just wanna encrypt the folder I store the private key and a few more files in.

[X7]

I was thinking of setting up a single cold storage instead of all my wallets, and I wanted to ask for some technical advice:

This is the plan I have:

1) Disconnecting my laptop entirely from the internet, then installing Bitcoin Core from a USB drive.
2) Running Bitcoin Core and backing up the wallet.dat file on a few external hard drives.
3) Disconnecting all the drivers and formatting the computer when the process is done

I was wondering if there are any flaws in my method? Any way my private key touches the internet?

And is there a safer way of generating a wallet than Bitcoin Core? I was thinking about running a third party up when the computer is offline. and how do I extract the plaintext privkey from the wallet.dat file?
There are gonna be thousands in there before I even think about withdrawing, so it's gonna be deposit-only for a couple of months, maybe years.

And I can't really get hold of a hardware wallet locally, I'd love to, but they're not available anywhere.

Thanks in advance.

Why go through this process? The USB could be infected, even if you are online it does not guarantee that the PC has malware which will compromise you once you're back online.

Just get a hardware wallet if you have any decent amount of holdings - even .5 BTC is worth $300 USD which justifies the hardware in the first place

[bitcoinisbest]

So how can I possibly eliminate the risk of a malware copying the private key and waiting for it to go online?

Use a completely new device that has never been online and never will be online. You could use something cheap like a Raspberry Pi.

What are the  features of Raspberry pi and how does it help us?

[achow101]

So how can I possibly eliminate the risk of a malware copying the private key and waiting for it to go online?

Use a completely new device that has never been online and never will be online. You could use something cheap like a Raspberry Pi.

What are the  features of Raspberry pi and how does it help us?

It's cheap, fairly easy to setup, and runs linux. Since it has no wireless networking capabilities built in, it is difficult to remotely hack.