The FinderOuter, a bitcoin recovery tool (v0.19.1 2024-01-24)

[dextronomous]

thanks a lot for another greater release.
i have a question, could you make it search in a specific bit range=x
thanks a lot.

[1714556801]

1714556801

[1714556801]

1714556801

[Coding Enthusiast]

thanks a lot for another greater release.

You're welcome.

i have a question, could you make it search in a specific bit range=x

If you mean something similar to the "puzzle solving" projects where they go from 2ⁿ to 2ⁿ⁺¹ to find the private key to an address/pubkey then I don't think I'll ever add such an option to FinderOuter since the purpose of this tool is to help users recover their coins not to solve puzzles.
But in some ways FinderOuter is essentially doing the same thing (although it needs more optimization), each option with a missing base58, base16 or mnemonic is searching within a fixed range.

I also have a plan to let the user limit the search space if that's what you meant. For example in mnemonic recovery user would be able to set a smaller range of words (like 5) to set in place of a particular missing word instead of using the entire 2048 words. This requires some major refactor so I'm putting it off for now.

[dextronomous]

thanks for the fast response, and yes that was a bit with the "puzzle" thing in mind,
like the range 8000000-fffffff or like with the numbers 1-160? great thanks noticing all the
changes you applying to you'r  newer versions. i noticed that with some lets say 17 characters
amount of total keys to check as with 16 characters missing, stayed the same.

but anyway a 110% release. and good luck so far.

[Volken]

I also have a plan to let the user limit the search space if that's what you meant. For example in mnemonic recovery user would be able to set a smaller range of words (like 5) to set in place of a particular missing word instead of using the entire 2048 words. This requires some major refactor so I'm putting it off for now.

That would be great. For missing characters inside a private key choosing options like "numbers only" or "letters only" or putting a range of potential characters that you would remember can be realy useful and a time changer.

[Coding Enthusiast]

i noticed that with some lets say 17 characters
amount of total keys to check as with 16 characters missing, stayed the same.

It shouldn't be the same. We simply compute 58^missCount using BigInteger (has no size limit) and report that as the total number of keys to check. So the result should always be different if the number of missing characters are different.
https://github.com/Coding-Enthusiast/FinderOuter/blob/26e3de339f56c702ddcfadaa8483dcc7ad1ea9c6/Src/FinderOuter/Services/Base58Sevice.cs#L106

[BlackHatCoiner]

Hi, I have a question. Let's assume that I've forgotten 1 word out of 12. This means that it'll have to try among 2048 combinations. Does it skip the checksum validation? Because if it checks for valid checksums it should not take that much time. For example, when I have 2 missing words, it has to check among 2048² different combinations. But if it counts the checksum, it should take less than an hour.

I remember a thread talking about mnemonic checksum, but I can't find it so I'll ask it here. How many are the valid mnemonics assuming that there is one word missing?

[Coding Enthusiast]

Hi, I have a question. Let's assume that I've forgotten 1 word out of 12. This means that it'll have to try among 2048 combinations. Does it skip the checksum validation? Because if it checks for valid checksums it should not take that much time. For example, when I have 2 missing words, it has to check among 2048² different combinations. But if it counts the checksum, it should take less than an hour.

I explained last time: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5214021.msg56129399#msg56129399
Let me know if you have any additional questions.

I remember a thread talking about mnemonic checksum, but I can't find it so I'll ask it here. How many are the valid mnemonics assuming that there is one word missing?

It is not possible to predict because it depends on how many collisions (purely by chance) we are going to get. It usually is somewhere between 120 and 130 for BIP39 and about 6 for Electrum.

[BlackHatCoiner]

I explained last time: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5214021.msg56129399#msg56129399
Let me know if you have any additional questions.

Okay then, I'll reply on your previous post:

The number of times checksum is valid depends on the size of the checksum, the bigger it is the less collision occurs and SetBip32() is called less times.
A 12-words BIP39 mnemonic only has a 4-bit checksum while a 12-word Electrum mnemonic has at least 8 bits of checksum (8 bits for standard type, 12 bits for other types).

4-bit checksum means 1 in 16. That's why you've written 261,774 (~ 2048² / 16) on the SetBip32() call count?

                   SetBip32() call count         time
BIP39                    261,774                00:02:44
Electrum-Standard         16,464                00:00:12
Electrum-SegWit            1,064                00:00:02
Electrum-Legacy2FA         1,057                00:00:02
Electrum-SegWit2FA         1,015                00:00:02

I still don't understand why you wrote 00:02:44. There is no machine that can do so many operations in such little time. On my pc, brute forcing a 12-words mnemonic with 2 words missing takes me around 12 hours. (Given only the address)

[Coding Enthusiast]

4-bit checksum means 1 in 16. That's why you've written 261,774 (~ 2048² / 16) on the SetBip32() call count?

Essentially yes. I modified the code to add a simple counter that incremented on each call.

I still don't understand why you wrote 00:02:44. There is no machine that can do so many operations in such little time. On my pc, brute forcing a 12-words mnemonic with 2 words missing takes me around 12 hours. (Given only the address)

It's not really that many operations.
Each SetBip32() method consists of 2048 HMACSHA512 + (path depth * 1 HMACSHA512). That is 2050 HMACSHA512 for brute forcing m/0'/0'. The 2:44 min is to compute 536,636,700 HMACs in total (it's actually a lot less due to using "specialized" code).
The specialized part is that FinderOuter isn't using the general HMAC functions, everything is specialized to compute only what it's supposed to. For example each HMAC consists of computing at least 2 SHA512 and each SHA512 has at least 2 blocks to compress. PBKDF2 (the 2048 round) repeats this in a loop where roughly 50% of it (4094 block compressions) is skipped on each call which greatly improves the speed.

The only reason why it takes a much longer time (hours) to recover using an address is because of issue #9. ECC on its own is very slow and my implementation of it turns out to be terribly slow.
Additionally when the path is something like m/0/0 the final round (after the PBKDF2) is to compute public keys (so there is an ECMultiply) which is a slow process itself. As a result the recovery process becomes a lot slower and the slowness of FinderOuter on top of it makes it take that long.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Additionally when the path is something like m/0/0 the final round

And for me that I want to brute force a lot of derivation paths, makes the entire process even slower. This is what I enter on these fields:

(Where "x" is the number I change every time)

I'd also like to ask something else. Is it possible to brute force multiple mnemonics one after the other? One per line? If not, do you plan on doing something similar in the future? (Like adding some extra features on FinderOuter, not necessarily multiple mnemonics at once)

[Coding Enthusiast]

I'd also like to ask something else. Is it possible to brute force multiple mnemonics one after the other? One per line? If not, do you plan on doing something similar in the future? (Like adding some extra features on FinderOuter, not necessarily multiple mnemonics at once)

Normally people have one mnemonic that is damaged and want to recover it and if they have more they can just enter the second one after the first finished. I don't think there is any point in accepting more than one at a time.
You can make minimal modification to the code to run it for yourself though.
Change this line into a loop where it breaks each line into a single mnemonic and makes the call. And modify the Init() on report so that it doesn't clear the report on each call.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Change this line into a loop where it breaks each line into a single mnemonic and makes the call. And modify the Init() on report so that it doesn't clear the report on each call.

I'll have to admit that your code is literally beautiful. Everything is organized and I can understand the functionalities of each file. Somehow, FinderOuter on Visual Studio 2019 goes really fast in contrast with my WinForms programs. Does it have to do with Avalonia? How did they manage to make it that light?


Anyway, I got off topic. What I wanted to say is that by changing line 149 on ViewModels/MissingMnemonicViewModel.cs and line 1483 on Services/MnemonicSevice.cs it's not possible. For example line 1425 on Services/MnemonicSevice.cs returns me "Invalid mnemonic length." when I try to add more than one mnemonics:

Code:

words = mnemonic.Split(new char[] { ' ' }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
if (!allowedWordLengths.Contains(words.Length))
{
     return report.Fail("Invalid mnemonic length.");
}

I guess that everything goes dominos if I change it to:

Code:

words = mnemonic.Split(new char[] { ' ' }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
if (!allowedWordLengths.Contains(words.Length) && Mnemonic.Split(Environment.NewLine, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries))
{
     return report.Fail("Invalid mnemonic length.");
}

Thanks in advance!

[Coding Enthusiast]

I'll have to admit that your code is literally beautiful. Everything is organized and I can understand the functionalities of each file. Somehow, FinderOuter on Visual Studio 2019 goes really fast in contrast with my WinForms programs. Does it have to do with Avalonia? How did they manage to make it that light?

Thanks. I believe XAML is generally cleaner and faster for UI development but I'm not sure since I haven't really used WinForms myself.

Anyway, I got off topic. What I wanted to say is that by changing line 149 on ViewModels/MissingMnemonicViewModel.cs and line 1483 on Services/MnemonicSevice.cs it's not possible. For example line 1425 on Services/MnemonicSevice.cs returns me "Invalid mnemonic length." when I try to add more than one mnemonics:

The FindMissing(..) in Service expects a single mnemonic, changing that is a lot of work so you should just change the ViewModel code to call it more than one time with each mnemonic instead of once
VM code turns into:

Code:

public async override void Find()
{
   string[] mns = Mnemonic.Split(Environment.NewLine, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
   foreach (var item in mns)
   {
      await MnService.FindMissing(item, MissingChar, PassPhrase, AdditionalInfo, SelectedInputType.Value,
                                  KeyPath,
                                  SelectedMnemonicType, SelectedWordListType,
                                  SelectedElectrumMnType);
   }
}

The FindMissing(..) method has to return a task to be awaitable:

Code:

public async Task FindMissing(string mnemonic, char missChar, string pass, ....

And since IReport.Init() on each call clears the message you have to change that so that on each call to FindMissing() the new messages are added at the end.
https://github.com/Coding-Enthusiast/FinderOuter/blob/681225416796a926479c8d246fb7afbf1e34484c/Src/FinderOuter/Models/Report.cs#L60

Code:

Message += $"{Environment.NewLine}Finished checking first input. Moving on to next.{Environment.NewLine}";

Now you can enter multiple mnemonics in mnemonic textbox in mnemonic recovery option separating them with a new line and each will be checked one after the other.

[BlackHatCoiner]

The FindMissing(..) in Service expects a single mnemonic, changing that is a lot of work so you should just change the ViewModel code to call it more than one time with each mnemonic instead of once

I did had changed that. I wasn't taking the entire string with all the lines and starting the brute force. I just used for loop instead foreach as you did. But, I still face the same issue. I replaced everything you said, the Find() and the Message on Report.cs, but still I ge tthe same error:

As for this one:

nvironment.NewLine

Why is it nvironment? Why not Environment? Based on your code, it doesn't seem you've used it as a variable.

[Coding Enthusiast]

but still I ge tthe same error

Try placing a break point where the error is being created and see what input is being checked. That should give you a good idea where the problem is. Here is the error message. See what the value of mnemonic is.
My guess is that the input is not split into separate lines correctly.

Why is it nvironment? Why not Environment? Based on your code, it doesn't seem you've used it as a variable.

That's a typo.

[BlackHatCoiner]

Here is the error message. See what the value of mnemonic is.

I don't believe that's the error message. Once I change it to the following I still get "Invalid mnemonic length.", that I shouldn't.

Code:

words = mnemonic.Split(new char[] { ' ' }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
if (!allowedWordLengths.Contains(words.Length))
{
    return report.Fail("Invalid mnemonic length. Mnemonic is: " + mnemonic);
}

I wanted to see, what mnemonic it reads. Is there any other part of the source code that prints the same error?

That's a typo.

Okay, changed.

[Coding Enthusiast]

I wanted to see, what mnemonic it reads. Is there any other part of the source code that prints the same error?

No. https://github.com/Coding-Enthusiast/FinderOuter/search?q=Invalid+mnemonic+length
All I can think of is that you should debug the code line by line and see where it calls report.Fail("") (remember to change to debug mode if you haven't already).

[BlackHatCoiner]

All I can think of is that you should debug the code line by line and see where it calls report.Fail("") (remember to change to debug mode if you haven't already).

It doesn't make sense. I comment the specific part of the code, but I still get the same error. Maybe, I do something wrong on building. Yes, I use Debug, but I've never used Avalonia in the past. Is there something that I have to prepair before building? I've also noticed that there is no syntax error detector shown in VS. For example, I can write something that is considered invalid inside a file, but it'll be normally built. It makes me curious. Do I change the program or not?

Code:

/*words = mnemonic.Split(new char[] { ' ' }, StringSplitOptions.RemoveEmptyEntries);
if (!allowedWordLengths.Contains(words.Length))
{
    return report.Fail("Invalid mnemonic length. Mnemonic is: " + mnemonic);
}*/

[Coding Enthusiast]

Maybe, I do something wrong on building.

Probably. This has nothing to do with the UI (Avalonia).
Inside your Visual Studio place a break on the Find method line and then go to Debug > Start debugging (F5).
After that enter your data in text boxes and click find, the execution should stop at that line where you placed the break.


Then continue pressing F11 to step into each method or F10 to step over until you figure out where the evaluation is failing. You can move your mouse over to any variable and see their value when in debug mode.

I can write something that is considered invalid inside a file, but it'll be normally built. It makes me curious. Do I change the program or not?

Did you open the solution file or the csproj file or did you just open the .cs file from your explorer? Because the only thing that I can think of is that when you open a .cs file you can't build it, it has to be inside a .csproj file.
This file: https://github.com/Coding-Enthusiast/FinderOuter/blob/v0.6.0.0/Src/FinderOuter.sln or this https://github.com/Coding-Enthusiast/FinderOuter/blob/v0.6.0.0/Src/FinderOuter/FinderOuter.csproj

[Coding Enthusiast]

Version 0.8.0 is released.
https://github.com/Coding-Enthusiast/FinderOuter/releases/tag/v0.8.0.0
See changelog for details.

• Some user interface improvements
• New recovery option: find BIP-32 derivation path
  Note: this is a simple option with only a handful of standard paths, I'll try finding more paths used by different wallets and optimize it but for now it is very basic.
  
• New recovery option: recover Armory backup phrases missing some characters
  Note: this option's speed is wildly variable because it depends a lot on the existence of the checksum. It can be from dozens of keys per second to hundred billion key per second. For example if the recovery phrase has its checksum and is missing 10 characters you can check 1 trillion variations and recover it in 1 second.
  
• Main window size has a limit so it can no longer be shrinked to nearly nothing

A small RoadMap

• For next release I'd like to work more on the user experience by adding a Help window where user can interact with at the start of the application and can figure out which option to use.
• I would also like to add some more "tips" to the UI explaining different terminology. For example explaining what WIF, Base58, derivation path, ... are.
• Let me know if there is any interest in changing UI theme like having light or dark theme instead of the default light one or a colored one.

Version 0.9.0 will probably be released with these. But I also have 2 more options in mind:

• BIP-39 passphrase (the extension words) recovery (hopefully for 0.10.0)
• BIP-38 password (for encryption) recovery

I've also started working on optimizing ECC to hopefully solve issue #9 but it's still very challenging.