How to use private keys post societal collapse

[Zedpastin]

There is no instruction manual for event like this, but I would never count on my brain and memory to remember 12 or 24 seed words,
I could always mix the order or make some other mistake, and if society collapses that would probably be a global event and not just local.
Having backup phrase hidden in multiple safe locations is much better option, and you can import it in any other hardware or software wallet that uses same seed phrase standard.
Problem is that economic and society collapse would affect internet, communication, electricity, food and everything else, so your best bet is to wait for all systems to be restored.

It is hard because the more places that you store your private seed the more chances of it being discovered by some one else. I recommend 2 highly secure places to store your seed because any more will not increase the security of it any more than storing it in 2 separate places but it will reduce the chance of someone discovering it and taking your Bitcoin. Economic collapse would not be as bad as a societal collapse. A economical collapse might be good for the adoption of Bitcoin because people would lose faith in the current money system. We have had recessions which people look for alternatives and I think that is one of the reasons that Bitcoin gained traction in the early days after the bank bail outs.

[Darker45]

You are talking of the worst that can happen. In that scenario, a piece of half-rotten potato has more value than Bitcoin. In a worst societal collapse, the only thing that matters is existence. We will all be returning to the basic. Food, shelter, and clothing. Forget about Bitcoin. Forget about money. They won't keep you alive.

I am not sure what you are getting at, though, or what you are trying to point out.

[Kittygalore]

You're hypothetical isn't even realistic, a bitcoin friendly zone won't exist because the first few years in a collapse is the worst year because it's the panic times and a societal collapse means infrastructure are untended and destroyed so it's unlikely a bitcoin friendly zone will exist.

[swogerino]

Hypothetical::So the worst has happened, economic and societal collapse. My family escapes to a bitcoin-friendly (or unfriendly) jurisdiction. I do not have my hardware wallet. Before fleeing I smashed it to pieces, least it's confiscated. Seed phrase memorized and ready to go. Now what?

Now first try to get the basics,in this new hypothetical country/zone that you evacuated you try to find food and shelter first.You wait patiently that the society starts building up again and only then restore your seed to a compatible wallet that will support the seed of your hardware wallet,mostly nowadays are BIP39 so any of them would do.Note that here hypothetically I am hoping for a rebuild first and that not all the world has collapsed but most of it.

[Fundamentals Of]

Now, that means you have successfully demonstrated how Bitcoin cannot be confiscated. That's a good way of illustrating how Bitcoin is indeed about complete ownership. You own your Bitcoin. In that way, your worth is kept safe and untouched despite a situation when the economy and society collapsed. The next steps that you will do are the ones detailed above my post.

But I will ask you, what exactly do you mean by societal collapse? Because if it is a situation when the entire society is reduced to rubles and people are going back to the primitive ways, then I'm afraid Bitcoin is also rendered worthless.

Bitcoin CAN be confiscated.This has been proven many times.Just ask the FBI or any Ministry of Internal Affairs in almost any country in the world.

In a different sense. Bitcoin can be confiscated not because the Bitcoin protocol itself has something which could be considered a weakness such that it could be exploited by the FBI or any ministry of internal affairs in almost any country, but because some Bitcoin owners are leaving a lot of traces behind. It is not due to Bitcoin that some coins are successfully confiscated. It is about those persons who made Bitcoin transactions. I stand with my claim that Bitcoin can't be confiscated.

[Adorocrypto]

Wow thanks for all of your replies, interesting discussion. The hypothetical is just an exercise attempting to educate myself as to what the hell to do with the seed words when in a jam. I am new to the space. So maybe we don't go as far as describing it as a total societal collapse. But it could be close, for example "society" can be a local situation.... let's imagine we are in Sydney right now, Marshall law, troops enforcing lockdowns, camps for the unvaxxed, etc. This IS happening, and I want OUT for example. Looks like I would need to secure a new BIP39 wallet wherever end up looking to be a free human being. OK fine but what if for whatever reason new hardware wallets are not available. And all I have is internet access...

[pooya87]

OK fine but what if for whatever reason new hardware wallets are not available. And all I have is internet access...

You don't need a hardware wallet to generate a BIP39 seed phrase, any small application or any of the dozens of HD wallets can do that. You can even create one with flipping a coin 128 times and converting the stream of bits to a set of BIP39 words. Then with any basic cryptography library (like OpenSSL) you can generate an address with less than 50 lines of code; or the alternative is obviously to use a bitcoin wallet, just pointing out that it is a very trivial process.

[o_e_l_e_o]

And all I have is internet access...

Then you download and verify a reputable open source wallet such as Electrum and import your seed phrase or private keys in to it. It will then generate the same addresses you had on your hardware wallet and give you access to the same coins. This just isn't very secure since you are exposing your keys to an online environment.

If you can't acquire a new hardware wallet and you want to maintain a similar level of security, then you would import your seed phrase or private keys to a wallet such as Electrum on a permanently airgapped (i.e. no internet connection ever) computer. You can then take the addresses or xpub from that airgapped wallet and use them to create a watch only wallet on your main online computer.