Hello,
I expect to download Electrum on my MacBook, create a password, save my private key in a secret place and send some sats on multiple receptions adresses on the wallet.
Should I then uninstall Electrum or keep the app on my MacBook ?
My two main concerns are:
- Someone steals my MacBook, connects to my Electrum wallet and discovers my password (by brute force or any other technique).
- I unfortunately download a virus on my MacBook which is able to steal my electrum wallet private key.
Am I a maniac guy or one or both above possibilities are plausible ?
Thanks !
If you are "a maniac" (a better wording could be security paranoid though) then you're doing it wrong from the early beginning.
If you create a file on your HDD, there's a chance it will be recovered, hence even if you remove Electrum won't help. I'd also add that if you uninstall Electrum software it will most probably not remove the wallet files.
The logic of creating the seed from Electrum and write it down is not that bad, but the execution kinda is.
If you want to do it safely and properly, the correct way would be to start a Live OS (started from an USB or CD/DVD without rights to write anything to disk or the USB) and run Electrum from there.
One pretty easy solution could be booting from an USB stick where you've written Tails OS. It also has Electrum, although some would argue you didn't verify it.
So.. boot from a live OS, obviously with no network set up and no network cable plugged in, run Electrum, create a new seed, write it down to paper, write down a couple of addresses (see addresses tab).
Boot again from the live OS (again, no network), start Electrum, recover from the seed you've written down, verify the addresses you've written down are there.
Now you have some sort of paper wallet. You can fund the addresses you've written down. You can verify the addresses' contend on online block explorers. Copy the seed on multiple pieces of paper and store them safely on multiple (geographically) different locations.