Changing wallet address in every 3-8 years advisable

[Razmirraz]

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

Changing your wallet address doesn't immediately make things secure. Blockchain is transparent, people can still track the movement of assets from address A to address B. Of course, that they know address A belongs to you. Changing your address is good for privacy, but it isn't the primary defense against hackers. Hackers do not target specific wallet addresses, nstead, they target individuals through phishing, fake emails, and fraudulent websites.

Moving assets from wallet A to wallet B does not make you invisible, however, if wallet B is a hardware wallet, your assets remain safe even if you accidentally click a malicious link, because a physical confirmation is required to authorize the transaction. So, after four years of consistently accumulating assets, moving them to a hardware wallet is the right choice, it demonstrates that the security of your assets has been elevated to the next level.

[ultrloa]

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

Why should it change every 3-8 years? Why not for each transaction? Remember, you must know that just changing addresses doesn’t help you to protect your wallet unless you protect your seed and wallet credentials. Changing addresses enhances your privacy and security as well. Because attackers target an address first and then move on.

However, I will advise you to change your address for each transaction. And you must use an open-source hardware wallet to secure your funds. Securing your funds doesn’t depend on any single fact. Everything is related to each other; if your wallet seed is compromised, then it doesn’t matter what address you have been using.

That's a good advice and people can actually try to execute that, since somehow that action is good for privacy of the user and it can help them experience less exploits. But the true protection will always come from their back ups, how they store it and the seed generated. This is the reason why I think that open source wallets truly matters, since its could can be verified or inspected by the community wants to do an audit with those wallet.

Strong security should be combined by this secure storage, super store passphrase and to secure their own storage. This may not totally protect the user, but it can help them to lessen their chances to experience a problem with this issues.

[Mia Chloe]

I have been thinking about this lately and I want to share it as it becomes a something think about, although I don’t know important or how cool it’s for one to keep changing their wallet address. For instance, if I have some certain amount stored in an electrum wallet address and after 4 years I should be able to move it out to a hardware wallet address.

There's no specific difference from creating a seed on a hardware wallet or a software wallet what could probably differ at most is the format and that depends on the seed dictionary used during the generation and the hashing type as well as you entropy source.

Technically speaking address reuse is not really safe but like a couple other members have mentioned most wallets these days are HD meaning you have more than one addresses under a single seed so when you make transactions your coins are automatically consolidated across those addresses.

[yudi09]

For technical storage with stronger security, use a cold wallet to store Bitcoin for periods ranging from 1 to 4 years. Electrum is a good Bitcoin wallet, but you should still be concerned if you plan to store your Bitcoin for up to 4 years, as there is a vulnerability that allows hackers to exploit addresses without an additional passphrase.
Sometimes, a mistake in the process can turn a good wallet into a bad one, even though the error actually lies with the user.

[Coyster]

but you should still be concerned if you plan to store your Bitcoin for up to 4 years, as there is a vulnerability that allows hackers to exploit addresses without an additional passphrase.

What vulnerability are you talking about, and in what wallet is it present? It is important not to spread fud and misinformation in this forum. If you are talking about the critical firmware vulnerability that existed in Coldcard devices, it is pertinent to note that it was peculiar to their products and not a general flaw in the bitcoim network or in any other bitcoin wallet.

[macson]

It is better for your assets to stay there; moving your Bitcoin to another address will not improve security, on the contrary it will only increase the risk. If you want to be more secure, then you could use a hardware wallet instead. That is a more logical option than constantly changing your address, which would not actually make your Bitcoin any safer in the first place.

[ColdLava40]

I have been thinking about this lately and I want to share it as it becomes a something think about, although I don’t know important or how cool it’s for one to keep changing their wallet address. For instance, if I have some certain amount stored in an electrum wallet address and after 4 years I should be able to move it out to a hardware wallet address.

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

Your opinion are welcomed.

If you use a good wallet, you won't be exposed to much risk.

Where the problem comes in is not about leaving your coins in one wallet for long, it is exposing it to the internet for too long. If you generate the wallet offline like some have said in an air gapped, it will be safe.

Moving the coins from wallet A to B may even be the beginning to your loss. What if you make mistakes and send to unknown address because you will do this from time to time. It is not a good idea.

[Odogwu-Blockchain]

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

Not getting hacked has nothing to do with changing your address. Infact hackers doesn't even penetrate to wallet through address, you already know it's through your seed phrase of you are careless about it-Those literally come from your close friends or relatives.

Hacking a centralized or decentralized wallet has to do with entering through the wallet through a vulnerable point of contact, it might be sales, software, tools and whatsoever, to access customer funds on a wallet, not through your address.

Been using one address on Binance and bybit since launched, nothing had happened yet, if I'm been hacked, then it's Binance fault not my address.

[PrivacyG]

Why should it change every 3-8 years? Why not for each transaction?

I assume OP is talking about a 'long term' receiving Address like the ones we are re using in signature campaigns,

if I have some certain amount stored in an electrum wallet address and after 4 years I should be able to move it out to a hardware wallet address.

[bitmover]

I have been thinking about this lately and I want to share it as it becomes a something think about, although I don’t know important or how cool it’s for one to keep changing their wallet address. For instance, if I have some certain amount stored in an electrum wallet address and after 4 years I should be able to move it out to a hardware wallet address.

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

Your opinion are welcomed.

Moving from a hot wallet to a hardware wallet is good.

But just moving coins  around doesnt make them safer.

Satoshi never moved his coins and they are still safe now.

The point is to generate the coins safely

[Ashawowo(OS)]

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

It depends on the wallet which represents wallet A. If it is Trustwallet or any wallet on a hot device, then the move is necessary to a cold wallet which is more secure and has not had any interaction with the internet.

If you use a HD wallet like Electrum as cold storage from the onset and backed your seeds properly offline, then there might be no need for such a move, you only need to stop reusing addresses, and optionally, but for more security, you can create a new Electrum wallet using the same seed phrase and add a passphrase to it and move the funds to the more secure wallet while you backup the passphrase separately from your seed phrase.

You don't need to be moving funds from one wallet to another at durations, if you are constantly moving, a time might come when you will move to a new wallet and forget to backup your seeds, then it becomes a problem for you.

[Ojima-ojo]

I have been thinking about this lately and I want to share it as it becomes a something think about, although I don’t know important or how cool it’s for one to keep changing their wallet address. For instance, if I have some certain amount stored in an electrum wallet address and after 4 years I should be able to move it out to a hardware wallet address.

I want to know, does this improve and enhance our security level for our investment? Because nowadays the manner at which people are getting fished or hacked is becoming increasingly alarming which to me I felt it would be that better to either moved out our assets from wallet A to wallet B just to make sure our investment wouldn’t be a major target for others.

Your opinion are welcomed.

Take example from Satoshi wallet, the million Bitcoin in the wallet have never moved from one wallet to the other, and inactive, but yet remain secured and private.


The goal is to protect your wallet as much as you can, and you will not need to keep moving your Bitcoin from one wallet to another unless when you have the suspension that your wallet security may have been compromised.

[PrivacyG]

Take example from Satoshi wallet, the million Bitcoin in the wallet have never moved from one wallet to the other, and inactive, but yet remain secured and private.

That is not the best example however.  It shows that his Bitcoin is still secure but if Satoshi is dead then he would not even be able to move any thing.

[Agathamay]

The wallets are HD wallets, it is not necessary needed to send all your bitcoin to a single bitcoin address. For privacy, you can send your coins to two, three, four or five addresses.

That is for privacy and not security. If you re referring to security, it does not help.

Use cold wallet if the amount is huge. Use passphrase of long and different characters. You can have more than one wallets, but making sure that they are also secure and safe.

You're correct sir but personally I wouldn't advise anyone to use more than one wallet be it for safety, privacy or what so ever, especially if the investor is intending a long term investment and this is because I prefer them having their focus fixed on a single wallet and how best to keep it safer rather than having to store and getting bothered about the safety of different of them and remember my emphasis are on long term investment.

Take example from Satoshi wallet, the million Bitcoin in the wallet have never moved from one wallet to the other, and inactive, but yet remain secured and private.

That is not the best example however.  It shows that his Bitcoin is still secure but if Satoshi is dead then he would not even be able to move any thing.

And what if satoshi is not dead?
Do you believe he might move it someday ?
And don't you think moving it might make it possible to trace him ?

Just curious because I don't believe satoshi might want to move those bitcoin atleast not anytime soon

[PrivacyG]

And what if satoshi is not dead?
Do you believe he might move it someday ?
And don't you think moving it might make it possible to trace him ?

My point was.  It is not a good idea to give a possibly dead person as a 'look, they did not do this so we should not either'.  I do not know what the rest of your questions have to do with the subject that is being discussed.  Not moving it for Privacy reasons would validate my point about it not being a good example, considering OP is not in the same situation.

[Ojima-ojo]

For someone who gets paid through bitcoin frequently, is advised to use a new wallet for each new payment, although this is for privacy and not security, if you want to talk of security if your wallet, the responsibility is left for you to improve and consider the security of your bitcoin in the first when dealing with wallet and your expectations, and changing of wallet address should be done under strict supervision to avoid making mistakes that can cost you more than the amount you want to protect.

[Orpichukwu]

You're correct sir but personally I wouldn't advise anyone to use more than one wallet be it for safety, privacy or what so ever, especially if the investor is intending a long term investment and this is because I prefer them having their focus fixed on a single wallet and how best to keep it safer rather than having to store and getting bothered about the safety of different of them and remember my emphasis are on long term investment.

You are looking at it from the securing different wallet point of view, but if we are also to look at it from the safety aspect, it’s safer the way Charles advised; you don’t have to be thinking about how to protect it separately. Just secure your wallet phrase and make sure it doesn't get exposed and add a very strong passphrase to it. That's all. If by chance you get one of your wallets compromised, the other will be safe; you won’t lose everything because of one mistake. That's one advantage of using multiple wallets.

[GreatArkansas]

Take example from Satoshi wallet, the million Bitcoin in the wallet have never moved from one wallet to the other, and inactive, but yet remain secured and private.

That is not the best example however.  It shows that his Bitcoin is still secure but if Satoshi is dead then he would not even be able to move any thing.

This makes sense. I am also thinking about instances where "the more conscious you are, the more worried you are about your Bitcoin", the more chance it will put in risks.
For example, if you are changing wallets every 3-8 hours or at any time, what if a time comes when, by mistake, you send to the wrong wallet address, or the backup of private keys or seed phrases missed some characters or words, it could happen. So instead, you are already fine and just enjoying life, and your BItcoin just sitting in 1 wallet; it's all lost.

[BlackBoss_]

This makes sense. I am also thinking about instances where "the more conscious you are, the more worried you are about your Bitcoin", the more chance it will put in risks.
For example, if you are changing wallets every 3-8 hours or at any time, what if a time comes when, by mistake, you send to the wrong wallet address, or the backup of private keys or seed phrases missed some characters or words, it could happen. So instead, you are already fine and just enjoying life, and your BItcoin just sitting in 1 wallet; it's all lost.

Sitting in only one wallet is bad because all funds stored in that one, and if we lost it somehow, we lost our all bitcoins.

Using different wallets for storage and diversification of our bitcoin as well as risk is very good but it raises the need of making proper and accurate wallet backups. About wallets, Satoshi Nakamoto recommended that Bitcoin users should never delete Bitcoin wallets.

The person who originally sent the broken transactions deleted his wallet

Sigh... why delete a wallet instead of moving it aside and keeping the old copy just in case?  You should never delete a wallet.

[shinratensei_]

I don't find the need if you used strong entropy to generate your seed phrase and you are not leaking your seed phrase which is the difficult part because sometime you don't know if your seed phrase got hacked because oversight, but overall if your seed phrase have strong entropy I don't think this is needed.

You will also be getting the another risk of accidentally sending your money to poisoning attack address if you move around your money too often because I'm sure you are testing transaction to the new address before moving the entire stash and address poisoning attack can come in impersonating your address with vanity address. Rarely happens and not necessarily a big threat I know if you are careful enough but the possibility is never 0.