its on my computer
Let me guess, you are running Windows.
Never use Windows to store your wallets.
This is bullshit. Running windows, never had any wallets stolen. Stupid people will install malicious software no matter which os they use. From what I see most of bitcoin stealing stuff comes with altcoin clients/miners and other bitcoin related software, a different os will not protect you from any of those.
As someone who has used both nearly every day since the beginning for windows (3.1) and a long time for linux/unix (prolly near 2000), and spent a lot of time learning security, the security model is completely different, especially considering features like SE linux.
I never let the kids use Windows, although I virtually never use it except for work, where i use it over 90% of the time. On Linux, they can't install things because I don't give them root. And, if they managed to install anything, the program would be limited to their access. on linux, the default user access only includes write to their home and tmp, and no one can read another user's access.
is it technically possible to compromise linux? of course. but, the contrast in likelihood is huge if you have kids using it, and you know how to secure the computer from the kids. i tried and could not find a way to secure the computer from the kids in windows. it's just to easy to hack -- and thus too easy for malicious software to infect.
at the end of the day, knowing what i know, i would never put more than i need to spend in one transaction on windows or a mobile device, including Android, because I understand how easily compromised they.
i may have created one of the first key loggers back in 1982 on an
Osborne 1 with the CP/M OS. it wasn't malicious. i just wanted function keys in dbase II to work. but, because it loaded as part of the OS, it was transparently intercepting all keystrokes no matter what software you were running. i'd demo by telling people to type "this". they'd be amazed when they watched and when they typed the last character, it would say "that". basically, it monitored for words and replaced them.
Then DOS came out with an official way to do this called the terminate stay resident function (TSR). Utilities such as Borland Superkey became available that used this.
Windows descended from DOS. Windows 3.1 originally ran on top of it. Being a single user OS, it has no security. Then, later, security concepts were introduced.
By contrast, UNIX was a network SO when linux was created by Linus. So, it was always built with user security in mind rather than an after thought. SE Linux is killer to have, especially on your servers, because it helps to lock down processes. then there is chroot and other user and process isolators.
Then there are the security implications of peer reviewed open source versus closed source. History has proven that hiding the source does not hide the vulnerabilities. Also, having a lot of developers collaborate on code is likely to be more secure than having very few develop and review critical parts.
That said, paper wallets rock. just don't lose, burn, get water on, etc,... your last copy! that would suck. While I trust Linux a heck of a lot more than Windows, if you have a lot, offload it to cold storage until you need it.
