How to properly store seed phrase during inspection?

[Oshosondy]

I am surprised to see this today on the news:

Police body cam leaks suspect's seed phrase during vehicle inspection

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

I am considering if traveling and fall into such situation or during inspection, what could have been done to avoid this? Let us assume the person is travelling, leaving where is leaving to work or stay in another town and his car was thoroughly inspected.

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

[1715547033]

1715547033

[1715547033]

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[livingfree]

Don't make it look like a seed phrase. People these days are aware of what seed phrases are look like.

Although this experience is one of the few and sorry for that guy that has to experience it but, I'm sure that many are learning from his experience.

Maybe have a sequence and jumble the combination but I think that someone who doesn't have a strong memory might forget it. At least make a pattern that you are the only one that knows it.

[Lucius]

It's simple, don't carry seed with you and such things won't happen to you. Although there are some exceptional situations when I can understand that someone has such a backup with them (for example, when moving), everything else is a completely unnecessary risk.

Regarding the actions of the police, I know that it is legal for them to record the entire procedure, but how legal is it for such recordings to be published on social networks? Isn't there some kind of data protection, especially if you are not guilty of anything and just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time?

The only thing that comes to mind is adding a passphrase to the seed, and in that case that data should be saved separately so that it cannot be exposed to this kind of situation.

[Maus0728]

Plot twist!

That seed phrase is actually a bait for you to send some amount of crypto that will serve as a transaction fee for a script that automatically removes it's balance LOL

[hd49728]

Is it an article sponsored by Ray Paxful?

When you store your bitcoins in non-custodial wallets, you should back up its seed. Backups (multiple backups) should be stored safely and hidden at secret locations. If you leave your backups at public places or anywhere that can be seen by others, that is not a good backup way.

How do you safely keep your recovery phrase written on paper?
Cops check your car, Mom cleans up your room, what else?

[mk4]

Your seed phrase is for instances where you lose access to your wallet; it's not something you should really be bringing everywhere. Imagine your belongings getting stolen and poof your crypto gets stolen with all your other stuff you brought.

[Ahli38]

Be honest if i imagine being in the same situation. so I'm also a little confused when it comes to finding solutions to the problem of storing seed phrases safely when we are in a situation where we have to carry them with us when traveling like moving or something like that.

the solution I think of if I want to move house. and of course have to carry everything including a spare sheed phrase of my crypto wallet.
maybe when I'm at home then it's safe when I write it on a piece of paper and keep it in a drawer with a sturdy lock.

but when we will move and take it with us. then I will do the following steps.

- take a book of novels / stories or similar thick reading books.

- took the paper that had my wallet's seed phrase written on it.

- I will start copying into the novel/thick reading book in the order of 1 word per sheet. It doesn't have to be the front page, we can start from the middle page. for example from page 20. if there are 12 seed phrases, then I will write 1 word on page 20, 1 word on page 22, 1 word on page 24, and so on until the 12 words have been copied at the novel/thick reading book.

- after making sure you copied correctly. then burn the initial paper that contains our wallet's seed phrase.

- and now we just need to keep the novel containing the seed phrase on the way safely. I'm pretty sure no one wants to open the page after page of the novel we brought. and if it opens it will certainly be cursory.

second way

We can save our wallet's seed phrase into a novel by bolding or underlining every word that matches our wallet's seed phrase. I don't recommend marking it with a highlighter because it's too obvious.

that's the only solution i could think of. hopefully help in keeping our crypto wallet safe on the way.

[Aanuoluwatofunmi]

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

We ultimately need to be careful not to expose ourselves to an attack all in the process of trying to secure ourselves from one, having your seed phrase written all over you is pretty danger because the only security to it is when your clothes always remains on you, whereas there are several scenarios that could warrant that same clothe off the body maybe when swimming, or having a summer hangout, there is much to do when it comes to securing the seed phrase because it's our key that needed ultimate privacy and inscription on the body isn't the best method acceptable for me, there are other ways we can use a metallic iron sheet to inscribe the keys and have them locked on a personal vault.

[BitDane]

I am considering if traveling and fall into such situation or during inspection, what could have been done to avoid this?

I think it can't be avoided since it was a possibly surprised inspection and police officer is checking everything.  Unless you left your seed phrase  at home or put it on a safety vault under bank's security service protection or the guy had it saved in a ledger or USB.

Let us assume the person is travelling, leaving where is leaving to work or stay in another town and his car was thoroughly inspected.

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

The best way to avoid the scenario is don't act suspicious. Don't break laws so that you won't get searched or arrested and your things confiscated and never bring your seed phrases around you.  Put it in a safe place where water and fire can't penetrate.

[NdaMk]

I don't buy the idea of moving seed phrase around where one is going. The weakest place to hide it is a vehicle that which we know is prone to search by inspectors. You can't predict the search even if you are law abiding. A two or more parment saves at home is better. At least a home search comes warrant.

[Frankolala]

We don't need to carry our seed phrase written down on paper to wherever we are going to even when traveling, because it is not safe,imagine the cops figured it out as his seed phrase,likewise any other person that knows about crypto can still know that its a seed phrase and can use it as an access to defraud him. Trying to be safe is exposing and making us venerable to attacks.

Your car is private but you can't stop the cop from searching it,so I will suggest that we should try our possible best to memorize these words that are our seed phrase, some are twelve and some are twenty four,you can just start from one day and start reciting it,six words for a start till it becomes part of you and you move to the next six and so on. This is not applicable to people with various wallets.

[hopenotlate]

Ouch that hurts!

don't know if it is feasable but, also reading some AI writing software threads lately here on this forum, an idea came to my mind : what am wondering about is something like
 - setting AI software to write an essay about a random topic
 - the topic must 12 ( or 24 or whatever the numebr of seed phrase words are) complete sentences long
 - each sentence must contain only one of the seed phrase word
 - the position of the seed word contained in each sentence is determined by a rule : for example first word is in first position of first sentence, second word in second position of second sentence and so on ( of course this rule is quite trivial and mentioned only as an example)


What do you thinks? Is it a total bullshit or what? If something like this might work how can it be strongly improved?

[arwin100]

I am surprised to see this today on the news:

Police body cam leaks suspect's seed phrase during vehicle inspection

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

I am considering if traveling and fall into such situation or during inspection, what could have been done to avoid this? Let us assume the person is travelling, leaving where is leaving to work or stay in another town and his car was thoroughly inspected.

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

Leave your belongings at home especially those important one so that no strangers can accidentally expose what you are hidden on the internet. Maybe try to buy a vault since this could make you more safety away to those people who try to create something nasty on your crypto balances.

This is lesson need to learn for people who keep carrying their passphrase or seed phrase anywhere because what happen to the person on topic might also happen to them.

[jrrsparkles]

First of all, I will not carry seed phrase to everywhere while travelling or anything. And I think secondary wallet filled with small amount is enough for the vacation or travel and the remaining should be in your primary wallet with seedphrase stored safely in your place where you consider it will be safer.

[Leviathan.007]

I am surprised to see this today on the news:

Police body cam leaks suspect's seed phrase during vehicle inspection

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

I am considering if traveling and fall into such situation or during inspection, what could have been done to avoid this? Let us assume the person is travelling, leaving where is leaving to work or stay in another town and his car was thoroughly inspected.

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

I'm just shocked and can't believe how the police body cam can find seeds that easily during a simple car inspection because they could hide the seeds in any place and I think if they could find the seeds like that there is no way to be completely sure about hiding a seed phrase. however I think they could hide the phrase like it's not related to bitcoin it's not a seed, so none would even pay attention to it. For example, they could create a note on paper or a book and create sentences with the words of seed phrases.

[Jatiluhung]

We don't need to carry our seed phrase written down on paper to wherever we are going to even when traveling, because it is not safe,imagine the cops figured it out as his seed phrase,likewise any other person that knows about crypto can still know that its a seed phrase and can use it as an access to defraud him. Trying to be safe is exposing and making us venerable to attacks.

Your car is private but you can't stop the cop from searching it,so I will suggest that we should try our possible best to memorize these words that are our seed phrase, some are twelve and some are twenty four,you can just start from one day and start reciting it,six words for a start till it becomes part of you and you move to the next six and so on. This is not applicable to people with various wallets.

But there are times when we are in a situation that requires us to bring our backup Seed Phrase. like we will move residence from one city to another. because I often do it for work reasons.

but hiding the 12 word seed phrase of our wallet isn't too hard on a journey. we can even write it on a small piece of paper and put it in the shell of the ballpoint pen we use. and put together ballpoint pens with other writing instruments. or many other ways.

after we arrive at our destination then we move the seed phrase back in the book or something like that and store it in a safe place.

[Smartprofit]

I read about a guy who was a tattoo artist. 

He had twelve mistresses and satisfied each of those twelve girls.  Over time, he bought himself 5 bitcoins and the question arose before him - how to store the seed phrase? 

He had an idea.  On the butt of each of his mistresses, he tattooed one of the words of the seed phrase.  He believed that this was a very reliable way to store seeds, but this turned out not to be the case.  All of his 12 mistresses once met, began to communicate with each other and conspired to rob him.  They have long guessed that the English word tattooed on their buttocks is the key to great wealth. 

The most difficult thing for them was to solve the sequence of these 12 words, but in the end they solved this riddle. 

They eventually withdrew his bitcoins to their bitcoin addresses and stopped communicating with the guy. 

As a result, this guy was very disappointed in this way of storing seed phrases.

[Artemis3]

You need to be creative, and whatever you end with, don't reveal it with anyone.

Think hide in plain sight, like a book with marks. Or just don't have it with you but somewhere online encrypted with a very good password only you know, stenographed in some image file, etc..

Hiding a few words is far easier than hiding a stash of cash or ingots. There is no need to carry with you but the minimal for the travel. You can also have multiple wallets just keep large amounts in cold ones.

[inthelongrun]

People should not straight-forward just write their seed phrases on a piece of paper or something. That's just too easy to figure out in case of unexpected incidents. Bitcoin is becoming more popular each day and more people have hints about what is a seed phrase already. What happened in the news is unlikely to repeat but there are too many possible scenarios in that other people might be able to see those seed phrases. Better to make it something of a puzzle so that nobody will think they are seed phrases.

[PX-Z]

I'm just shocked and believe how the police body cam can find seeds that easily during a simple car inspection because they could hide the seeds in any place and I think if they could find the seeds like that there is no way to be completely sure about hiding a seed phrase.

A car is just so small that you can eventually see anything that was keep inside especially if an "inspection" is done because most cars have common place where to keep belongings either in compartments, under the seat, etc.

About the how's on making the seed secured especially those written in papers, i guess it differs from person to person and experiences.
With my paper backup i don't write numbers or even put "Ledger" or anything related to crypto in that backup just to be safe to anyone else.

[NeuroticFish]

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

1. Why do you need the seed go with you? There are many ways of thought an maybe, just maybe, you don't need the seed go with you. Imho this would be best.
2. If there's a backup seed still there at home, maybe storing it encrypted / password protected on 1-2 USB sticks would do the job.
3. The seed is a text, hence it can be disguised in plain sight, like (already said) underlining words in a book, or even having 2 pieces of paper with different parts of the seed (people can mistake them for 12-words seed and they are together a 24-words seed).
4. Go to https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0039/english.txt and convert your list of words into a list of corresponding numbers.

[Apocollapse]

I wonder why someone need to carry his own seed phrase to everywhere he go? does there's a chance he will use huge amount during travelling? I don't think so, because you must have enough cash in hands and not put all of your money in Bitcoin. If you're really want to transact with Bitcoin (considering you're travelling to country that accept Bitcoin like El Salvador and Central African Republic) you can install non custodial wallet on your phone and only carry small amount on there.

[harapan]

I read about a guy who was a tattoo artist. 

He had twelve mistresses and satisfied each of those twelve girls.  Over time, he bought himself 5 bitcoins and the question arose before him - how to store the seed phrase? 

He had an idea.  On the butt of each of his mistresses, he tattooed one of the words of the seed phrase.  He believed that this was a very reliable way to store seeds, but this turned out not to be the case.  All of his 12 mistresses once met, began to communicate with each other and conspired to rob him.  They have long guessed that the English word tattooed on their buttocks is the key to great wealth. 

The most difficult thing for them was to solve the sequence of these 12 words, but in the end they solved this riddle. 

They eventually withdrew his bitcoins to their bitcoin addresses and stopped communicating with the guy. 

As a result, this guy was very disappointed in this way of storing seed phrases.

How can he even do such a thing even the dumpest human will crack that code down, cracking the codes will never be difficult.

He has himself to be blamed is it that he has so much money to loose giving to the orphanage would have been better option.

Why would someone carry his seed phrase around just like that, that is not good idea, those twelve words can even carried in once head, loss of memory will only cause one to forget but for safety reasons write it down.

[DdmrDdmr]

I don’t know if anyone has found any information on the aftermaths of the seed being displayed in the manner it was. Fortunately, the handwriting is pretty awful, making it not straight forward at all to depict the actual 24 words on the list (don’t tell me no one has given it a go with the BIP39 list alongside).
 
What seems surprising is that the video is actually circulating freely around the internet. I’d have thought that Nevada police recorded videos are not accessible to browse unless deliberately released for the public interest, and this particular case doesn’t seem to be of the kind.

One side effect to ponder is that, regarless of the funds themselves, the seed will give whomever access to browse through all the historical TXs related to the wallet, which although semi-anonymous, can lead to revealing information one would not want to be revealed.


Note:
Funny article heading I stumbled across whilst trying to find additional information on the event:
https://pcomnews.xyz/police-camera-leaks-suspects-sperm-sentence-during-vehicle-inspection/

Some internet posts that copy article from third-party sources sometimes make some comical minor adjustments, which change the meaning altogether …

[Yawa2020]

How can he even do such a thing even the dumpest human will crack that code down, cracking the codes will never be difficult.

He has himself to be blamed is it that he has so much money to loose giving to the orphanage would have been better option.

Why would someone carry his seed phrase around just like that, that is not good idea, those twelve words can even carried in once head, loss of memory will only cause one to forget but for safety reasons write it down.

Moving around with seed phrase is absolutely wrong unless in certain circumstances like changing of location or something of similar. But saying those twelve words can easily be stored in once head is not as simple and easy as it sounds. Learning it off hand is never an issue but the chance of interchange is very high not even talking about of memory loss. Written with caution is somehow better.

[Queentoshi]

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

Walking around with something as important as that is an error first of all, secondly, I feel a good job was not done trying to keep the seed phrase safe. During inspection, the police person doing the inspection is not a machine and should simply understand you if you demand that he searches wherever you have dropped your seed phrase in the vehicle ensuring that his body cam doesn't capture it. You are not refusing the inspection, just letting them know the importance of what you have and how they can put your legal investment at risk exposing your seed phrase to the body cam, they can inspect that side with their eyes, not a body cam.

[len01]

It will be easier if you don't get the seed phrase out of the house and instead store them in a box or keep them in your bedroom cupboard, it's that simple.
but if you really want to move house and are forced to take that seed phrase with you, it's better to save it in your cellphone's photo gallery and when you get to your destination you can rewrite it on new paper.
actually things like that for me are very simple but some people sometimes carelessly carry seed phrases wherever they go.

but if it happens to me while on the road and there is an inspection by the police, I hide it first in the dashboard of the car which is very difficult for the police to reach.

[kryptqnick]

Why was the video released? I understand why body cams should be there and record inspections, but isn't it just so it can be reviewed upon request if there are allegations of misconduct or if something bad happens? Why was the video published online at all? Obviously, the seed is enough to take the money out, and now anyone could have done it. It's been 8 months, though, as the cam says the date is April 22. So there must have been a follow-up, as surely someone typed in the words and took the money? I can't see information about such stuff, though. If the money was stolen, and it was the police who published the bodycam video, I'd say the officers should be held accountable for leading to a loss of funds.
As for prevention of such situations, I think it's safer to store a seed in a mix of other text, so that you know it's a seed, but others can't.

[Hispo]

What about creating a second seed/wallet before the travel and getting an address for it, then proceed to create a transaction with the money from the first seed to the second one you just created.

this transaction would be intended not to be broadcast until you reach your destination, this way, in case your seed gets revealed, it would be the second one which is empty, so you can choose not to broadcast the transaction, leaving your funds safe at home.

[DdmrDdmr]

<…>

The video does indeed show the date of the recording to be the 22/04/2022. Not sure when the video was first released, buy what the crypto media have picked up on corresponds to a fragment of a nearly 54 minute long video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-aJ--1-DFgQ

The above link is a month old, and has 1,2M views since then. I haven’t checked if there are prior releases though, but it’s likely that the video was leaked months after the recording, limiting the damage from the tenancy point of view, though not the privacy one. What's more, the full video, I believe, identifies the dude, and I think I caught wind of him giving a home address.

There are a couple of reddit threads that state that the person they searched was a former-fbi agent, and currently worked in cyber security:

https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/zo9i21/lesson_learned_cop_pulls_over_former_fbi_agent/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/zo7nq1/cops_pull_over_former_fbi_now_cyber_security_self/

The details may be in the video, but I can’t be bothered to go through it all. He does say he works as a contractor, has what looks like a law enforcement badge and a bunch of other stuff. Watching the video in full may corroborate what the above two links state.

[Oceat]

This is a lesson to all bitcoiners traveling with their seed phrase because, some bitcoiners are now joining police or army force which they know how all those seeds phrase look like in someone document or system. I used to save my seed phrase in a place nobody can discover and, even though you discover the place, it will be difficult for you to know is a seed phrase I store there because, I have learnt from other people mistakes not to expose my seed phrase to anybody.

This will be a lesson to someone in the future to not bring your seed phrase with you or simply do not make it obvious that you have a seed phrase with you in times like the unexpected inspection. There are times this kind of thing or other things will bound to happen so it's best to leave or hide your precious seed phrase to somewhere that no one could intervene except you or the person you trusted with the seed phrase.

Although, we don't know what happen to the wallet or is there something left on it this is a very valuable lesson to everyone.

[coupable]

This is a lesson to all bitcoiners traveling with their seed phrase because, some bitcoiners are now joining police or army force which they know how all those seeds phrase look like in someone document or system. I used to save my seed phrase in a place nobody can discover and, even though you discover the place, it will be difficult for you to know is a seed phrase I store there because, I have learnt from other people mistakes not to expose my seed phrase to anybody.

It's a matter of privacy. While the adoption increases, events of lost seeds and lyked passwords. And as the use is popular, do not expect to find everyone preferring Bitcoin because it gives more privacy, but only because it can be used instead of money and provides an available investment. These same people are the ones who save large amounts of crypto on trading platforms and do not have the courage to be responsible for their money in private wallets.

[Oshosondy]

To let the seed phrase remain in words, using a very strong passphrase would be the best I could think about, encrypting the seed phrase can also be good, but I will prefer to just extend the word with a strong passphrase which its backup will not be in the same place with the seed phrase.

I wonder why someone need to carry his own seed phrase to everywhere he go? does there's a chance he will use huge amount during travelling? I don't think so, because you must have enough cash in hands and not put all of your money in Bitcoin.

What if the person is relocating like I said on the OP? There are situations that you may have your seed phrase with you while traveling, but relocating is the only reason tht came to my mind as of now.

If you're really want to transact with Bitcoin (considering you're travelling to country that accept Bitcoin like El Salvador and Central African Republic) you can install non custodial wallet on your phone and only carry small amount on there.

This is a good option, hardware wallet and cold wallet is not even meant for the purpose of carrying it about, just a wallet on a mobile phone with small amount of coins would be better.

[Hamphser]

Don't make it look like a seed phrase. People these days are aware of what seed phrases are look like.

Although this experience is one of the few and sorry for that guy that has to experience it but, I'm sure that many are learning from his experience.

Maybe have a sequence and jumble the combination but I think that someone who doesn't have a strong memory might forget it. At least make a pattern that you are the only one that knows it.

when you are really that too careless or confident about those phrases to be stored on something which is really that too exposed then you do have that kind of risk which it is really that
normal and its true that this would really be a lesson learned for those people  who do really see this kind of situation to be possible for your keys to be exposed.
When you are really that actively making some travels or transfers then it is really just right on storing up your keys on something which isnt really on your side always like
on having on your own home or would be stored up on places which cant be easily exposed.Its true that it would really be that wise on making some shuffle of words
and combinations on your phrases.As long it cant really be read up by someone easily then it would really be considered to be safe.You are obliged and the ones responsible
for these stuffs.

[suzanne5223]

Don't make it look like a seed phrase. People these days are aware of what seed phrases are look like.

Although this experience is one of the few and sorry for that guy that has to experience it but, I'm sure that many are learning from his experience.

Yes, cryptocurrency enthusiasts will learn a lesson from what happened to the guy whose police stopped and search his vehicle. However, writing a seed phrase and not making it look like a seed phrase is not a good idea because it will only take an experienced cryptocurrency enthusiast 2 seconds to figure out the phrase was a crypto wallet seed phrase. Just like the second cop in the recorded video did.
I think the best thing we can do is come up with a secret code for writing seed phrases which is what I do, in my seed phrase I rewrite everything in the language that only I understand.  An example, C-O-D-E = Y-B-O-Z

Maybe have a sequence and jumble the combination but I think that someone who doesn't have a strong memory might forget it. At least make a pattern that you are the only one that knows it.

This will be better, and this is why it's better to have a safe deposit box or vault.

[Darker45]

There are probably a number of ways not to make it obvious. I guess it's not anymore safe nowadays to just merely list words. Worse, in the case of what happened in Nevada, it was also indicated that the funds are kept in a Ledger wallet.

This is also what I actually did with my seed phrase. There was a PIN and a password along with it, making it clear it was a seed phrase. Perhaps we could write a letter instead or perhaps a poem or whatever that uses the words in order. Or perhaps it is not really wise to keep it in your wallet. It's probably better to roll it really thin and hide it inside a small pocket of one of your clothes in your bag or even inside the hem of a shirt.

[m2017]

Of course, it is absolutely not a reasonable idea to carry seed phrase with you. I don't know this guy's motives, but he was definitely unfortunate enough to meet law enforcement. But if there is a need to transport the seed phrase, then, as you can see, transporting it in plain text and without any changes is fraught with the security of your funds.

As already mentioned above, you don't need to do like the hero of this video. Keep seed phrase only in a safe place and don't touch unless absolutely necessary. If you need to transport the seed phrase, then you can use various methods to make it difficult to access information. In order not to repeat the suggestions of other users, I can recommend, for example, installing an encrypted Linux OS on a USB flash drive and saving the seed phrase (or immediately enter the seed phrase into the electrum so that it is not in clear form and, if necessary, you can receive / send btc). Of course, it is not permissible to connect to the Internet using this OS. Or take security measures to avoid leakage of this information.

This is not the safest method for a number of reasons (for example, due to the likelihood of a flash drive failing), but in some situations you can use it.

[NotATether]

Put your seed phrase(s) inside a small opaque bag, small enough so that it can't contain any guns or knives or anything like that. Maybe even an old and otherwise empty wallet will do the trick (and why the hell would police insist on searching there?).

[hopenotlate]

- cut -
There are a couple of reddit threads that state that the person they searched was a former-fbi agent, and currently worked in cyber security:

https://www.reddit.com/r/CryptoCurrency/comments/zo9i21/lesson_learned_cop_pulls_over_former_fbi_agent/
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/zo7nq1/cops_pull_over_former_fbi_now_cyber_security_self/

The details may be in the video, but I can’t be bothered to go through it all. He does say he works as a contractor, has what looks like a law enforcement badge and a bunch of other stuff. Watching the video in full may corroborate what the above two links state.

In my opinion it is high unlikely a former FBI agent moreover expert and currently engaged in the cyber security sector can act in this unprepared way of storing their private keys even if actually there is some clues that can induce in thinking so and he self declare to be a hacker if I understand correctly.
Weird story imo.

[yhiaali3]

Something really strange, at first I wonder why the police publish this video on social media? Isn't this a violation of the law?

The second surprising thing is why this person carries his initial phrase with him in the car. This is a very dangerous behavior, because even if the police do not search his car, he may be exposed to theft, an accident, or anything else that causes him to lose his initial phrase and lose his money.
Unless he's moving out of his house permanently, why would he carry his initial phrase in the car and not simply leave it somewhere safe at home?

Of course I am sad about what happened with the man, his initial phrase spread on the Internet and all his money may be lost, but his negligence and lack of proper security measures is the reason.

[CryptSafe]

Costly mistakes people do make which put them on the plunge. How on Earth would he be driving around with such sensitive document or details as the case maybe. I believe the officer had no idea what he was opening hence he allowed the camera to capture the phrase because I see no reason why he should continue allowing the camera on the phrase. Well the camera is for evidence of action if there are any cliams or counter claims from any party and it serves well for fairness.
Looking at this situation, the police should not have made this public as it contains sensitive details to assets or funds which is to be kept away from the public and they breached his right by doing so. If his wallet gets hacked who is to blame for the deed otherwise we assume it to be a public stunt because I wonder how a reasonable human can still make public such details after getting to know what it is.

[Antonas1]

That's weird.
But despite all the weirdness of the video, if you still want to bring your seed phrase with you every day, you can change the letters to numbers using this as a guide :

A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

Example: rocket rainbow super power
Convert it to a number and write it down like this:

17.14.2.10.4.19
17.0.13.1.14.22
18.20.15.4.17
15.14.22.4.17
^{Point as separator.}

You can write it wherever you want as long as it's safe. I prefer to use a military dog tag.

[libert19]

I was going to criticize him than I realized I do same — have 2fa codes in my pocket too, numbers aren't that obvious as seed phrases but still pretty much same.

[Piesel]

A seed phrase is not something to travel around with even with movement from one location to another, there are better ways to avoid the risk of getting one seed phrase exposed and what ops mentioned is an outright violation of the right of the citizen.

Yes the police have the right to search but what gave them the right to make the entire process live, I don't think they have warrant for a search, and this situation is just a stop and search between border towns. And as the case is it is better to keep your seed phrase encrypted somewhere that only you have access to on your mobile device but PC yes.

[Davidvictorson]

Don't make it look like a seed phrase. People these days are aware of what seed phrases are look like.

Although this experience is one of the few and sorry for that guy that has to experience it but, I'm sure that many are learning from his experience.

Maybe have a sequence and jumble the combination but I think that someone who doesn't have a strong memory might forget it. At least make a pattern that you are the only one that knows it.

Agreed. Another crazily stupid idea that I wouldn't advise anyone to do unless you have exhausted all your options is to get 2 pieces of paper and place half of the seed on one of the papers and the other half on the other piece of paper, so that if the police searches your car (as in the scenarios explained by the OP), his body camera will only reveal one half of your seed phrase to the whole world.

[Casdinyard]

Well for one, I don't think having your seed phrase with you at all times is the best idea for storing. Considering how many personal affects a person loses in their person already. If you are going to store your cryptocurrency on a self-custodial wallet' might as well choose cold ones and only pull the seed phrase out for whenever you really need it. Most of the time you should keep it somewhere safe like a safety deposit box inside your home, secured in itself with a lock and key that only you could open, as well as a trusted person for emergencies. I do those and thus far, despite me being POC and being pulled over god-knows-how-many I don't ever encounter a situation like what you posted.

[tjtonmoy]

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

I will share my method here. Hope this can help you guys. I have made an algorithm simple plus minus math, actually. If I do it correctly, then I can find my seed phrase easily.
Write down some words, just random words to fill up the page. You can use many math equations available out there.
Let's try the Fibonacci sequence, for instance. You can count the number that comes in that sequence and point out those words from that random word's list. Then from your seed phrase finish to start, Not start to finish. (you can also randomize the phrase using some math, up to you) Put those words where your Fibonacci sequence leads to. Then replace those random words from the list with your reverse seed phrase. If the sequence leads to a bigger number, then limit it to a small section and repeat.
You can do this with row and column. Or diagonally.
I think it will be very hard to crack. And even someone sees the page, they won't be able to find the seed phrase

[akuntester1]

I am surprised to see this today on the news:

Police body cam leaks suspect's seed phrase during vehicle inspection

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

I am considering if traveling and fall into such situation or during inspection, what could have been done to avoid this? Let us assume the person is travelling, leaving where is leaving to work or stay in another town and his car was thoroughly inspected.

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

Of course there are many ways to store the seed phrases that we have.
Everyone has a different way to save it, as long as we are not careless in saving it.
I prefer to save the seed phrase by making it a random sentence or cipher and only I know.
I keep it in my office and put it in a personal safe, not for traveling, of course.

But who knows we will experience unexpected bad luck.
Of course we cannot avoid bad luck, because what I saw in that case I consider it a bad luck.

[TommieSang]

I read about a guy who was a tattoo artist. 

He had twelve mistresses and satisfied each of those twelve girls.  Over time, he bought himself 5 bitcoins and the question arose before him - how to store the seed phrase? 

He had an idea.  On the butt of each of his mistresses, he tattooed one of the words of the seed phrase.  He believed that this was a very reliable way to store seeds, but this turned out not to be the case.  All of his 12 mistresses once met, began to communicate with each other and conspired to rob him.  They have long guessed that the English word tattooed on their buttocks is the key to great wealth. 

The most difficult thing for them was to solve the sequence of these 12 words, but in the end they solved this riddle. 

They eventually withdrew his bitcoins to their bitcoin addresses and stopped communicating with the guy. 

As a result, this guy was very disappointed in this way of storing seed phrases.

lol It's a sad story, but I couldn't help laughing. It was a miracle to get 12 girls together, and he deserves the lost bitcoins. Hahaha

[Bitstar_coin]

How would someone expose their seed phrase like that in the first place? seed phrases are supposed to be stored in a place where no one except the owner can have access to it, keeping them in such an open or not so secured place is inviting trouble.
If you must travel with seed phrases then try as much as possible to memorize them so that no one else can know about them, it is much safer this way.

[Ebede]

As an option - just save on some media. But, here it is worth paying enough attention to safety. In this niche, this is a very important aspect.

It is been depends on your own aspect of understanding exactly what the opa saying because if you understand it to the other side that we I've been in understanding this stuff I think you will know the exact thing to do, on this kind of kiss you don't need to follow anyone what you have to do is to follow your own wish and their own methodology

[Jon_Hodl]

I am surprised to see this today on the news:

Police body cam leaks suspect's seed phrase during vehicle inspection

It is about a suspect that police searched his car and body camera revealed the suspect's seed phrase to the whole world.

I am considering if traveling and fall into such situation or during inspection, what could have been done to avoid this? Let us assume the person is travelling, leaving where is leaving to work or stay in another town and his car was thoroughly inspected.

Is there a possible way that can be avoided?

Use passphrases with the majority of your holdings in them and just keep a smaller amount of bitcoin in the main wallet. If this guy had done this, he could have kept most of his holdings in different wallets using different passphrases and only some in the main wallet that was confiscated by the police. When they sweep the primary funds, the majority of the remaining funds aren't stolen.

You can also use something like a QR code to make it impossible to read unless you use certain software or try to hide it in plain sight like written down on something super tiny in your vehicle user manual or something. Sometimes hidden in plain sight might be a better solution when dealing with the authorities because they're not looking for the normal stuff. They're looking for something out of the ordinary.

[dansus021]

Plot twist!

That seed phrase is actually a bait for you to send some amount of crypto that will serve as a transaction fee for a script that automatically removes it's balance LOL

I actually have seen this on couple of telegram group channel. Usually scammer send the full of crypto seed and ask for help how to transfer money.

(* scammer usually using fake token with add liquidity so they can fool trust wallet system make it look very real )
And of course someone will actually pick it up, add some bnb and auto transfer it

beware Yall

[TOMmiendfd]

I read about a guy who was a tattoo artist. 

He had twelve mistresses and satisfied each of those twelve girls.  Over time, he bought himself 5 bitcoins and the question arose before him - how to store the seed phrase? 

He had an idea.  On the butt of each of his mistresses, he tattooed one of the words of the seed phrase.  He believed that this was a very reliable way to store seeds, but this turned out not to be the case.  All of his 12 mistresses once met, began to communicate with each other and conspired to rob him.  They have long guessed that the English word tattooed on their buttocks is the key to great wealth. 

The most difficult thing for them was to solve the sequence of these 12 words, but in the end they solved this riddle. 

They eventually withdrew his bitcoins to their bitcoin addresses and stopped communicating with the guy. 

As a result, this guy was very disappointed in this way of storing seed phrases.

lol It's a sad story, but I couldn't help laughing. It was a miracle to get 12 girls together, and he deserves the lost bitcoins. Hahaha

Not your keys, not your coins.

The way everyone saves the mnemonic is really strange. I personally think that it is safer to remember it in my mind. To be on the safe side, I will choose the second method to engrave it on the tombstone I prepared.

[Silberman]

Plot twist!

That seed phrase is actually a bait for you to send some amount of crypto that will serve as a transaction fee for a script that automatically removes it's balance LOL

I actually have seen this on couple of telegram group channel. Usually scammer send the full of crypto seed and ask for help how to transfer money.

(* scammer usually using fake token with add liquidity so they can fool trust wallet system make it look very real )
And of course someone will actually pick it up, add some bnb and auto transfer it

beware Yall

I have heard about a few similar cases myself so it is important to be careful as scammers are making use of any tactic they can think to get to our coins, and about the question presented by the OP, a simple option could be to bring an old notebook with you and then write part of the seed words on different pages, this way no one can tell at a glance that those words are part of your seed and you will have no problem passing any kind of inspection this way.

[laurenB7742]

Plot twist!

That seed phrase is actually a bait for you to send some amount of crypto that will serve as a transaction fee for a script that automatically removes it's balance LOL

I actually have seen this on couple of telegram group channel. Usually scammer send the full of crypto seed and ask for help how to transfer money.

(* scammer usually using fake token with add liquidity so they can fool trust wallet system make it look very real )
And of course someone will actually pick it up, add some bnb and auto transfer it

beware Yall

I have heard about a few similar cases myself so it is important to be careful as scammers are making use of any tactic they can think to get to our coins, and about the question presented by the OP, a simple option could be to bring an old notebook with you and then write part of the seed words on different pages, this way no one can tell at a glance that those words are part of your seed and you will have no problem passing any kind of inspection this way.

Your method is also a good way to avoid security cameras saving the seed phrase, or my way is to record the seed phrase in a notebook, but we don't need to write all 12 or 24 words but write down 11 or 23 words, and the last word we can memorize and memorize in our head. It's like an optional part when we create a wallet on Electrum wallet, choose a familiar word to us, so it's easy to remember without saving it anywhere.

[Oshosondy]

You can also use something like a QR code to make it impossible to read unless you use certain software or try to hide it in plain sight like written down on something super tiny in your vehicle user manual or something. Sometimes hidden in plain sight might be a better solution when dealing with the authorities because they're not looking for the normal stuff. They're looking for something out of the ordinary.

The easiest way to put down a seed phrase would be to write it down, I can not use pencil or pen to write down seed phrase using QR code, which would be the reason I will not recommend it, also because it can fade with time. I will not even be convenient to have the seed phrase on QR code at all, unlike just having it on paper. Having passphrase with it will be better.