What is the connection between Seed and Private Key?

[cuttie018]

I'm trying to understand what is the connection between them. I have the seed from Electrum wallet, but I don't have private keys. In Sibit, the command line client, I have private keys. How they are related?

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[AB de Royse777]

I'm trying to understand what is the connection between them. I have the seed from Electrum wallet, but I don't have private keys. In Sibit, the command line client, I have private keys. How they are related?

You do have. Open the wallet then follow this:

Wallet -> Private keys -> Export

You can export them or you can copy and paste them in a notepad.


Read this:

In summary, a the private key is what lets you access the funds associated with one public address in your wallet. But when you create new public addresses for each new deposit to your wallet for security reasons, it also creates a new private key which means when you backup your wallet, you’ll have to save all these public key - private key pairs. Instead if your wallet is Deterministic, you could simply use the seed words to restore your wallet. Seed words can be used to programatically generate all the public key - private key pairs you own.

[OmegaStarScream]

The private keys and addresses are derived from that seed. Take a look at these articles[1][2] for a better understanding.

[1] https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Seed_phrase (Explanation part)
[2] http://docs.electrum.org/en/latest/seedphrase.html

[crairezx20]

A private key is for a single bitcoin address and Seed is a long series of words and all bitcoin address and private keys are inside of this seed.

You can only backup private key if you are planning to backup only a single bitcoin address.
But if you want to backup all private keys and BTC addresses from your wallet you should have a seed phrase in order to import it to other wallets.

[bitmover]

The seed is everything you need to tell the software to generate all the privatekeys of your wallet.

All your privatekeys are mathematically related

[BrewMaster]

every private key is just a number in a very big range. every time you generate a new key you are selecting a number at random in this range. like wanting to select a random number between 1 and 100 each time. now imagine if you had a formula that helped you choose that number in that range by only knowing 1 value as its input. a formula like this: number = c²+x³ for x = 0,1,2,... if you had your c=5 then you could get different random numbers in range of 1 to 100 with your different c.

now that range is so much bigger than 1 to 100, and it is from 1 to a little less than 2²⁵⁶ and that "formula" is so much more complicated and pseudorandom, it is a series of hashed message authentication codes aka HMAC using SHA512 hash function and your "c" is itself a very big number.

[Velkro]

The private keys and addresses are derived from that seed. Take a look at these articles[1][2] for a better understanding.

Yes but remember you need software to recover private keys/public addresses from seed and in future software will change and it will be more problematic to recover keys from old seeds securely.
Most basic form of controling your funds are private keys, from private key you have full control and from private key you can create your public address.

[Lucius]

You can export them or you can copy and paste them in a notepad.

Playing with private keys in HD wallets is not something that is smart to do, this can only increase the chance of someone came into possession of such backup, especially if the private keys are stored in digital form without encryption. Also every infected computer can get such info via screen logger, or in some other way, it's actually just another additional and completely unnecessary attack vector.

Every time user is send coins, new change / receive address is created, and that means new private keys.

[Little Mouse]

Will I be wrong if I say seed holds the whole wallet, act as the wallet back up and private keys hold the authenticity of each address you need.

[TryNinja]

Will I be wrong if I say seed holds the whole wallet, act as the wallet back up and private keys hold the authenticity of each address you need.

That sounds right to me for a quick ELI5.

The seed is responsible for generating your specific private-keys. Your private-keys are responsible for "owning" the address.

[hatshepsut93]

You can export them or you can copy and paste them in a notepad.

Playing with private keys in HD wallets is not something that is smart to do, this can only increase the chance of someone came into possession of such backup, especially if the private keys are stored in digital form without encryption. Also every infected computer can get such info via screen logger, or in some other way, it's actually just another additional and completely unnecessary attack vector.

Every time user is send coins, new change / receive address is created, and that means new private keys.

Some wallets, like Electrum, have inherent flaw where any single private key and master public key are enough to get all private keys of a wallet, so you should always treat private keys of such wallets as if they were your seeds. This means never import private keys into some altcoin wallets to claim forks, even if corresponding addresses are empty, don't share it with anyone just for fun and so on.

[Polina_21]

A private key is a unique alphanumeric number that is generated automatically when you create a wallet.

Before you were supposed to hold your private keys safely to secure your coins. But now it has been changed, you need not have to remember a private key for securing your coins. There are more ways to secure your coins, one is through a "Seed".

A seed is 12,18 or 24-word mnemonic phrase which will be created when you create a new wallet. You need to note down this seed on a piece of paper or in a secure place. Because if the device is lost or stolen, you can use this seed to recover your coins.


Before -

"Don't own your private keys, you don't own your cryptos"

Now -

"Don't own your Seed, you don't own your cryptos"

[pooya87]

You can export them or you can copy and paste them in a notepad.

Playing with private keys in HD wallets is not something that is smart to do, this can only increase the chance of someone came into possession of such backup, especially if the private keys are stored in digital form without encryption. Also every infected computer can get such info via screen logger, or in some other way, it's actually just another additional and completely unnecessary attack vector.

Every time user is send coins, new change / receive address is created, and that means new private keys.

Some wallets, like Electrum, have inherent flaw where any single private key and master public key are enough to get all private keys of a wallet, so you should always treat private keys of such wallets as if they were your seeds. This means never import private keys into some altcoin wallets to claim forks, even if corresponding addresses are empty, don't share it with anyone just for fun and so on.

it obviously would have been better if the hardened paths were used but i wouldn't call that a flaw exactly. users don't usually reveal one private key plus master public key, there isn't any situation for it. for example when claiming shitforkcoin they either import 1 private key or they import their seed which endangers their whole wallet anyways.

[hatshepsut93]

it obviously would have been better if the hardened paths were used but i wouldn't call that a flaw exactly. users don't usually reveal one private key plus master public key, there isn't any situation for it. for example when claiming shitforkcoin they either import 1 private key or they import their seed which endangers their whole wallet anyways.

But people treat master public key much less serious, they can send it to themselves via email, store it in plaintext (Electrum stores it in unencrypted form in watch-only wallet by default) or even just post it somewhere online. In my book that's a flaw - it might not be critical, but it's still there, and in the long run someone will lose money because of it.

[o_e_l_e_o]

A private key is a unique alphanumeric number that is generated automatically when you create a wallet.

A seed is 12,18 or 24-word mnemonic phrase which will be created when you create a new wallet.

Neither of those statements are quite accurate.

When you create a new wallet, the only thing it will create from scratch is a long random number which is known as the seed. Everything else (mnemonic phrase, private keys, public keys) is ultimately derived from this number. To turn this number in to a mnemonic phrase, it is split up in to sections of 11-bits in length which correspond to a number between 0 and 2047, and then each number is matched to the corresponding word in the BIP39 word list here: https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0039/english.txt. When you restore a wallet from your mnemonic phrase, it essentially reverses the steps, turns the words in to 11 bit numbers, pieces them altogether, and outputs your seed.

To derive your master private key, the wallet performs a function known as HMAC-SHA512 on the seed. This master private key can then be used to further derive individual private keys, and therefore public keys and addresses.

[JeotQ]

I use coinomi wallet alot and i have come to understand that recovery seed works for only one single public address,if you create another public address you will need to extract your private key for that second address to have 100% access to your fund.

[mynadira]

I think both of them are unique codes that are used for access to the user's wallet, by combining seed and private key, the wallet you have will be safer.

[o_e_l_e_o]

I use coinomi wallet alot and i have come to understand that recovery seed works for only one single public address

This is incorrect. Coinomi (as with most wallets) is what is known as a hierarchical deterministic (HD) wallet. These wallets use the seed to create unlimited private keys and therefore unlimited public keys and addresses. If you have your seed backed up, then you can use that to restore access to any and all public addresses ever used.

if you create another public address you will need to extract your private key for that second address to have 100% access to your fund.

This part of your statement is correct. If you are storing private keys, then you need to have the private key for each address. There is a 1-to-1 relationship between private keys and addresses. However, private keys are not the same as seeds. The seed will give you access to all your private keys.

by combining seed and private key, the wallet you have will be safer.

This doesn't make sense.

[ezeobulu007]

Seeds and private keys, although may sound different, does the same work which is working as an extra security option especially when you lose your password and again some platforms make use of one of both (either seed or private keys) while some uses both.