Seed phrase security question

[AkhiMertail]

Hi this is a random question but is it possible for my seed phrase on hardware wallet to be compromised by an app using my iPhone microphone ? I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me. I’m also kinda high and paranoid? I see lots of posts about ppl taking photos of their phrases and losing their coins so I didn’t know if saying my phrase out loud was a bad idea.VidMate  Mobdro

[mk4]

While it's quite unlikely, it's technically very possible.

And since you're paranoid to start with(which is good in a sense), just simply generate a new wallet instead; for your peace of mind. And this time, don't sing it out loud. You should be writing it down instead in the first place. Imagine if you get into an accident or a concussion that caused you to lose a part of your memory. I wouldn't risk that especially if you have a good amount.

[Charles-Tim]

Hi this is a random question but is it possible for my seed phrase on hardware wallet to be compromised by an app using my iPhone microphone ?

There is nothing malware can not do, so be careful with your seed phrase.

I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me

There has been some numbers and words I memorized for months and yet I later forgot after I thought I have memorized it off hand. I would even think I can not forget it, it can be some just one or two numbers that I will forget. Do not depend on your brain for long term memory, it might not work. Backup your seed phrase offline is better, having like three copies safely backup somewhere not accessible to attackers and resistant to damages.

[BlackHatCoiner]

I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me. I’m also kinda high and paranoid?

No, you're not. Nowadays, mobile phones record you to provide you the best advertisements. I once was talking about Star Wars Battlefront and after a while I got an advertisement about a cheap PS4... 

You should never trust a closed-source operating system with:

• Your voice.
• Your pictures.

No, taking a picture of your seed phrase isn't secure obviously. If someone gained access to your mobile phone, he could steal your money. If I were you, I'd just generate another seed phrase and I wouldn't try to memorize it or include it on any computer/phone. Just hide it in several places, so that if you lose one piece of paper, you can replace it with your back ups.

[acroman08]

Hi this is a random question but is it possible for my seed phrase on hardware wallet to be compromised by an app using my iPhone microphone ? I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me. I’m also kinda high and paranoid? I see lots of posts about ppl taking photos of their phrases and losing their coins so I didn’t know if saying my phrase out loud was a bad idea.

just like what mk4 said it's quite unlikely, it is possible to happen. I'd recommend being cautious(especially when an app is from an unknown provider) when an app your downloading or downloaded is asking to access your files, photos, camera, and microphone on your phone. taking a photo of your seed phrase is one of the reckless things you or someone can do if you want to protect it. one of the best and easiest way to protect your seed phrase is to just write it on paper and store it in a safe place. you can even make a copy of it in case you lost or ruined the first one you made.

[smyslov]

Save yourself of whatever is bugging you by transferring all your coins to another wallet, generating a new wallet is free although you will spend for transaction fee, at least you will be free from thinking that your seed phrase is not safe, you can save yourself with sleeplessness night and too much worrying, even if it is unlikely that your seed phrase is compromised.

[odolvlobo]

Hi this is a random question but is it possible for my seed phrase on hardware wallet to be compromised by an app using my iPhone microphone ? I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me. I’m also kinda high and paranoid? I see lots of posts about ppl taking photos of their phrases and losing their coins so I didn’t know if saying my phrase out loud was a bad idea.

I think that the probability of forgetting the phrase is much much higher than the probability that someone recorded you.

[pawanjain]

Hi this is a random question but is it possible for my seed phrase on hardware wallet to be compromised by an app using my iPhone microphone ? I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me. I’m also kinda high and paranoid? I see lots of posts about ppl taking photos of their phrases and losing their coins so I didn’t know if saying my phrase out loud was a bad idea.

If Siri can keep listening to commands on your iphone why not the other apps. If you have such an app which uses your microphone then the chances of someone listening to it on the other hand is quite possible. Although unlikely as mk4 said it is still possible. But you need not worry about it much since such a scenario is highly unlikely and yeah saying out your phrase loud is definitely a bad idea for someone if not the iphone might be listening to you and you won't even know.
Changing the seeds would be a good thing to start with. Memorizing the seed might be good but not having backup of the seeds is definitely wrong.
You should always have multiple backups of your seeds and store it in a password protected file or encrypt it as suited.

Also, taking photos is not my kinda thing since I am paranoid as well. The first thing which gets leaked from our devices are photos.
So I wouldn't risk my seeds in it.

[mk4]

You should always have multiple backups of your seeds and store it in a password protected file or encrypt it as suited.

Also, taking photos is not my kinda thing since I am paranoid as well. The first thing which gets leaked from our devices are photos.
So I wouldn't risk my seeds in it.

You don't even need to be paranoid to take photos as backups. It's simply just a dumb idea. Period.

As for creating digital backups, regardless if it's encrypted, definitely do NOT do this unless you're 100% sure in what you're doing. You may well indeed get the result of having a securely encrypted backup, but there's just so much things that can go wrong in the process that can leak your keys.

[nakamura12]

You don't have to be paranoid since the wallet with the seed phrase you are singing doesn't have any cryptocurrency stored so nothing to worry unless you have stored some crypto in it then you need to generate another wallet and transfer the funds right away and your good to go. If ever you wanted to store your seed phrase safe try to use to encrypt your seed phrase using an encryption program offline and store it somewhere else that doesn't have internet connection. Try to visit this thread for more information about encryption https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5342058.0.

[The Cryptovator]

Why are we using a hardware wallet? Because it's been hiding your wallet credentials from internet attacks. For security reasons, your seed from the device wouldn't steal by any software. Otherwise, there is no meaning to using a hardware wallet. But if you save the seed at any device anyhow then it's pretty simple to steal for hackers. So depends on the situation how are you saving your seed. Just write it on hard paper, keep it in multiple places. So even a piece of paper damage then you would recover it from another piece. Don't store it on any device either online or offline. Because your device would damage or steal at any time. If you lost your backup means your funds are gone.

[bL4nkcode]

It could be better if you just write it down and be quiet about that, memorizing such info could be bad just what others mentioned above.

What I actually do is write the whole 21/22/23 words put it online (not recommended by others which is true) for easy access and put the missing word/s out in a safe place. Ofc, you can do what others said, but that just me, did that since 2017.

[Eureka_07]

Hi this is a random question but is it possible for my seed phrase on hardware wallet to be compromised by an app using my iPhone microphone ? I was singing my seed phrase to memorize it and realized my phone was right next to me. I’m also kinda high and paranoid? I see lots of posts about ppl taking photos of their phrases and losing their coins so I didn’t know if saying my phrase out loud was a bad idea.

IMO it is possible, only if your device has some spyware on it. If your phone is secure, it should be fine.
It is great if you have a very good memorization skills, since you won't need to worry where and how you should store those seed phrases away from possible access of other people, as your own memory is your storage.

[o_e_l_e_o]

Go to your privacy settings and you will be able to see all the apps which have access to your microphone. Any one of these could have been recording your voice whether or not it was actively running at the time.

Memorizing the seed might be good but not having backup of the seeds is definitely wrong.

Memorizing the seed phrase is the one of the worst possible ways to back it up.

You should always have multiple backups of your seeds and store it in a password protected file or encrypt it as suited.

And this is one of the other worst possible ways to back it up. Unless you are generating and encrypting it on a permanently airgapped computer running a live open source OS, then chances are you are going to leave some unencrypted traces of it somewhere. Just turning off your WiFi and then adding a text file with your seed phrase to a password protected ZIP file or something similar is not secure enough.

What I actually do is write the whole 21/22/23 words put it online (not recommended by others which is true) for easy access and put the missing word/s out in a safe place. Ofc, you can do what others said, but that just me, did that since 2017.

This is also a terrible idea. One word can be brute forced in seconds, and even three words can be brute forced in under a day with good hardware.

Just write it down on paper like you are supposed to.

[mk4]

What I actually do is write the whole 21/22/23 words put it online (not recommended by others which is true) for easy access and put the missing word/s out in a safe place. Ofc, you can do what others said, but that just me, did that since 2017.

This is also a terrible idea. One word can be brute forced in seconds, and even three words can be brute forced in under a day with good hardware.

Just write it down on paper like you are supposed to.

I'm with o_e_l_e_o on this. This is a terrible idea, only exception being unless you created well made air-gapped encrypted storage with absolutely ZERO fuck-ups in the process. Hopefully you actually do know what you're doing.

[pawanjain]

Memorizing the seed phrase is the one of the worst possible ways to back it up.

The context here is not about backing up the seed by memorizing it, instead, it is backing up through some preferred way as well as memorizing the seed.
There's nothing wrong if you can memorize the seed and have it securely backed up as well.
I know we might lose memory and forget the seed and in that case we can just use the backup.

Just write it down on paper like you are supposed to.

It's still not secure enough. You might lose the paper in some way or get it torn.
There's no proven way which can guarantee to store the seeds securely. We just have to back up the seeds with the least risk.

[BlackHatCoiner]

It's still not secure enough. You might lose the paper in some way or get it torn.
There's no proven way which can guarantee to store the seeds securely.

There is a proven way to store it securely. There is no proof that it'll remain in the same place, that's why you have to maximize your security. I consider the paper way, the most secure; you don't store anything electronically and thus, you're proving to yourself that no malicious party can access your money. If you worry about your computer's RNG, roll a dice instead!

Write it on a paper or on a steel. Create back ups, so that if you somehow lose your main steel/paper, you'll have a way to restore it. Don't memorize it; burry it in the ground, hide it inside your walls, be creative!

[bL4nkcode]

What I actually do is write the whole 21/22/23 words put it online (not recommended by others which is true) for easy access and put the missing word/s out in a safe place. Ofc, you can do what others said, but that just me, did that since 2017.

This is also a terrible idea. One word can be brute forced in seconds, and even three words can be brute forced in under a day with good hardware.

Just write it down on paper like you are supposed to.

I'm with o_e_l_e_o on this. This is a terrible idea, only exception being unless you created well made air-gapped encrypted storage with absolutely ZERO fuck-ups in the process. Hopefully you actually do know what you're doing.

Ye, I get that. That's why I said it's not recommended, but it work for me.

But the way I put it online is not just obvious labeled file "my recovery seed" or anything similar that is crypto related text. So, no one would know it's something like that. And no one will randomly brute force to guess on such file content that has more than 24 words written on it (well, I guess?)

But ofc, I have one written on a paper, but still the same process, just the 21/22/23 words and just put the remaining online for an easy access. If ever that piece of paper got burned, lost, wet or etc. Well, that's for a guy that has no permanent address/house.

[boyptc]

Check if you've got unnecessary applications that have been allowed to connect using your microphone. Don't be paranoid. If you're aware of it then you're just trying to be secured.

But to remove your worry and fear. Create a new wallet with another seeds and transfer your balance there and just record the new seed on a paper.

[o_e_l_e_o]

It's still not secure enough. You might lose the paper in some way or get it torn.

That's why you practice redundancy. Back it up more than once on more than one separate pieces of paper, and store these pieces of paper in separate geographical locations. If you are concerned about one of your pieces of paper being discovered, then ensure that it does not contain all the information required to steal your coins: Use an additional passphrase, encrypt your seed phrase, split your seed phrase, etc. Make sure that any additional information required to recover your seed phrase is also backed up on separate pieces of paper and also stored in separate geographical locations.

But the way I put it online is not just obvious labeled file "my recovery seed" or anything similar that is crypto related text. So, no one would know it's something like that.

Security through obscurity is generally a poor choice for protecting valuable information.