A sneak peak at the future of Bitcoin Cold Storage

[crazy_rabbit]

You are supposed to use them with multi-sig and in a group of at least 3. Meaning at least one or two should be sitting somewhere safe. The third you can take out with you and show around no problem. But walking around with Titan Mint or Casacius coins is asking to get jumped and lose all your money, no?

Walking around with a shiny glass phallus is asking to get jumped too.

Well, sexual innuendo aside. If you are robbed with a physical bitcoin like the commonly minted coins, your funds on that coin are lost. If you are robbed with this device, your funds are still safe.

[crazy_rabbit]

the main problem with any kind of chip being used is the lifetime of the chip, nobody knows exactly how long they will last. Would you trust a usb stick to last 5 years?

Yes I would trust a USB stick to last 5 years. Unlike the many hard drives that have given up the ghost on my watch, I've been using USB sticks and other solid state media since their inception and never once had a problem that I can recall.

This problem can be partially mitigated by using multisig. It can be further mitigated by pre-crafting an 'escape' transaction that is not broadcasted but when used can transfer all the bitcoin stored onto the device to yet another address. It can be even further mitigated by printing out your private keys, encrypted with the private key that is physically inside the device.

There are a lot of ways to handle this scenario. It all depends on your ability to manage your secrets. This device should go a long way in helping you to do just that.

[vapourminer]

about the life of the chip.. when I think "long term" I think 30, 50 years. as in bury it in the ground or something and my myself or my descendants dig it up  and can use this device alone, with no other info, and recover the coins (assuming the technology to read it still exists).

having it with a lawyer as part of the traditional estate isnt an option if youre hiding it from *everyone*

if Im reading the specs right, this device alone then will not be suitable without some external object (printed keys as a backup to the data in the chip say). or can all that info be in the device itself, perhaps some printed on a slug inside thats not visible till broken? but then how does the user get that printed slug inside?

just thinking on possible uses as the glass enclosure itself should last for centuries, even if the chip itself fails or the tech to read it fades to obscurity.

EDIT: CT scanners are not exotic tech; we have one in the office (smallish multi provider medical practice). they are (relatively) common nowadays. point being that if a CT scanner can read the slug or whatever the physical media is in the device, just having it unbroken may not in itself be a guarantee its not compromised.

So as you say, physical security is important too.

[crazy_rabbit]

about the life of the chip.. when I think "long term" I think 30, 50 years. as in bury it in the ground or something and my myself or my descendants dig it up  and can use this device alone, with no other info, and recover the coins (assuming the technology to read it still exists).

having it with a lawyer as part of the traditional estate isnt an option if youre hiding it from *everyone*

if Im reading the specs right, this device alone then will not be suitable without some external object (printed keys as a backup to the data in the chip say). or can all that info be in the device itself, perhaps some printed on a slug inside thats not visible till broken? but then how does the user get that printed slug inside?

just thinking on possible uses as the glass enclosure itself should last for centuries, even if the chip itself fails or the tech to read it fades to obscurity.

EDIT: CT scanners are not exotic tech; we have one in the office (smallish multi provider medical practice). they are (relatively) common nowadays. point being that if a CT scanner can read the slug or whatever the physical media is in the device, just having it unbroken may not in itself be a guarantee its not compromised.

So as you say, physical security is important too.

A lot can happen in 50 years, and as happy as I would be if bitcoin is still around then and we are all wonderfully rich, it might be impractical for us to be thinking that the nature of the protocol as it exists to day will still be fundamentally the same in the next 50 years, if existing even at all. At the moment I am thinking for the lifetime of existing technology which I believe to be reasonable.

As I mentioned before- there are many different levels of hiding from *everyone*. You can't beat writing a novel in your head, memorising it word for word, and using that as the seed for your brain wallet. That my friend, is SECURITY.

But tradeoffs are tradeoffs and if you're hit in the head by a falling piano and laying in a coma, such security will more likely work against you rather then for you. After all, unless you really are a criminal, the chances you fudge up your cold-storage solution are much higher then being hunted for each of your m-of-n hidden devices.

Of course, I can't help but reference:



EDIT: If you have a CT scanner, any chance when my device is ready I could send you one to scan? :-)

[billysweird]

Wow looks great kinds of reminds of the superman crystal, anyway would be nice to see bitcoin cold storage like that, let me know when u have it out.

The superman crystal was actually an inspiration. I'm glad someone picked up on it already.

Here is another shot of the current prototype. Next iteration should be a bit smaller, more uniform in the color (This is as tricky process- it's coated with a really special process using plasma lightning in a super hot vacuum chamber, using a badass technology that was previously used to coat warheads or other such military uses by the soviets. Indeed the factory is in one of the post-communist states. The coating is ultra hard. Seriously crazy/cool.)

https://i.imgur.com/P9pcCCc.jpg

The idea is for it to be a one time use only- you put your bitcoin inside, and you store it away for that one day when bitcoin hits $1 million. The idea came originally from my attempt to laser engrave bitcoin private keys inside diamonds. It's a fantastic idea, but there's no way to get away from the fact that you have to trust the manufacturer. These devices you don't have to trust the manufacturer (me) at all to use it.

But I wanted to pick up on the same sort of value and, nearly, durability of diamonds. A problem with paper wallets is they aren't necessarily obviously valuable to everyone. Nor are QR codes on objects. So I thought to make a device that if someone like your descent were to find, they would naturally protect the device and recognize that it has value, even if they don't know what it really is. Hopefully should help to prevent accidentally lost bitcoins, and because the device is not cheap, it's like a piece of sculpture or art, it should also make anyone tempted to panic sell think twice before destroying the device to get the bitcoin inside. Yes, to obtain the bitcoin inside, it must be destroyed. :-)

Looks like good, hope can develope

[MOON_2000]

Yes, like they said, don't drop it, and I am sure you will be able to find some takers, what a great conversation piece, right? 

[crazy_rabbit]

Wow looks great kinds of reminds of the superman crystal, anyway would be nice to see bitcoin cold storage like that, let me know when u have it out.

The superman crystal was actually an inspiration. I'm glad someone picked up on it already.

Here is another shot of the current prototype. Next iteration should be a bit smaller, more uniform in the color (This is as tricky process- it's coated with a really special process using plasma lightning in a super hot vacuum chamber, using a badass technology that was previously used to coat warheads or other such military uses by the soviets. Indeed the factory is in one of the post-communist states. The coating is ultra hard. Seriously crazy/cool.)



The idea is for it to be a one time use only- you put your bitcoin inside, and you store it away for that one day when bitcoin hits $1 million. The idea came originally from my attempt to laser engrave bitcoin private keys inside diamonds. It's a fantastic idea, but there's no way to get away from the fact that you have to trust the manufacturer. These devices you don't have to trust the manufacturer (me) at all to use it.

But I wanted to pick up on the same sort of value and, nearly, durability of diamonds. A problem with paper wallets is they aren't necessarily obviously valuable to everyone. Nor are QR codes on objects. So I thought to make a device that if someone like your descent were to find, they would naturally protect the device and recognize that it has value, even if they don't know what it really is. Hopefully should help to prevent accidentally lost bitcoins, and because the device is not cheap, it's like a piece of sculpture or art, it should also make anyone tempted to panic sell think twice before destroying the device to get the bitcoin inside. Yes, to obtain the bitcoin inside, it must be destroyed. :-)

Looks like good, hope can develope

Thanks! I'm on yet another round of prototypes. Basically trying to figure out the best way to solve a few tricky problems, also slowly starting to build on the 'business end' of the business. It's exciting though. I've decided I'm probably going to for sure stick with tried and true NFC tech, the latest being the NTAG216 series. It's just to risky to try and develop anything custom in terms of the electronics when it comes to storing funds. This way people can also develop around the device on their own. I'm hoping to have an initial version of software that allows you to save your Android Bitcoin Wallet backup directly into the device. We will see!

[crazy_rabbit]

Current prototype history- working on new ones now to fix various issues. Trying to make it smaller, more svelte, higher manufacture quality, etc...

[wanellane]

I look forward to seeing how this develop will work. Good luch and patience!

[tesene]

That is SWEET!

[zeetubes]

Many years ago I went to the Lalique factory in france. As others have pointed out, this is very pretty and some would want to show it off. In addition to an NFC model, you could also make an empty device which people could insert an encrypted paper wallet or small flash drive/chip into. They could then keep one or two backups in a safe place and one on display (empty or not) without having to worry too much if it gets stolen. That might also allow you to get off the ground quicker and get some income to keep developing the ultimate model. It may also give you access to a wider audience than just the BTC community.

As to the dildo comments, have you seen the number of womens' deodorant sticks that look phallic? That is definitely a marketing plus.

[crazy_rabbit]

Many years ago I went to the Lalique factory in france. As others have pointed out, this is very pretty and some would want to show it off. In addition to an NFC model, you could also make an empty device which people could insert an encrypted paper wallet or small flash drive/chip into. They could then keep one or two backups in a safe place and one on display (empty or not) without having to worry too much if it gets stolen. That might also allow you to get off the ground quicker and get some income to keep developing the ultimate model. It may also give you access to a wider audience than just the BTC community.

As to the dildo comments, have you seen the number of womens' deodorant sticks that look phallic? That is definitely a marketing plus.

That's a very interesting idea- Although I'm not sure how you could insert anything into it. The design like this is supposed to be entirely sealed making it water proof, but also making it nearly impossible for anyone to access the inner contents without it being obvious to you. If there is a way to put something inside of it, then you can probably take something out as well, or stick a really small camera inside, you know?

Actually the NFC tech isn't the bottle neck for this project. The bottle neck is working the glass surprisingly enough, something we hope to have sorted out soon.

Also, you can always show one off without worry if you use it with multisig, or if you split your private key. But I see what you mean. :-)

[zeetubes]

You can't beat writing a novel in your head, memorizing it word for word, and using that as the seed for your brain wallet.

Many tend to try this

The first time I really read about crypto was a WWII novel called The Key to Rebecca when I was in my early teens. In that book, each of the parties had the same copy of a book called Rebecca and the code for each character in the encrypted message would list the page number, the line number and the letter. Horrible for a long message but not bad for a password. Impossible to break unless you knew the book. 

[crazy_rabbit]

After having a look at the onename project,  https://onename.io/ I am thinking to define a NFC standard for working with cryptographic applications and NFC.

NFC uses NDEF standard, but I was thinking that for universal compatibility with devices that might not even be NFC related, it might be a good idea to developed a JSON style standard for saving data on NFC chips (Or 'mini' json standard to save space).

This would allow multipurpose use of the device I am developing but also maybe could standardize this sort of thing for other devices as well. For example, originally I was thinking to store bitcoin wallets on the device itself (ones with limited number of keys) however HD wallets are slowly becoming the norm, so it would be more practicle and space saving to only save the seed, which depending on the NFC chip could leave room for other things like a OneName seed as well.

[SunSeeder]

I hope you made more than one copy of cold storage. For example of you made a paper Waller have a hand full of copies. Wouldn't want to find out your "secure" copy got destroyed.

[phillipsjk]

I hope you made more than one copy of cold storage. For example of you made a paper Waller have a hand full of copies. Wouldn't want to find out your "secure" copy got destroyed.

Please read the thread. m-of-n keys are the key here. Can be done with a Pay to Script Hash

[crazy_rabbit]

Small Update, still working on the prototype. I've decided to call the product a "KeyVault" and it's cryptoagnostic meaning it doesn't have to be for bitcoin. I envision it working with onename.io, mastercoin smart properties, bitcoin, bitmessage and many other crypto projects.  I have a new logo for the business as well- I hired the guy who made the "bitcoin logo" featured on Coindesk as I liked the look and wanted to hire a bitcoin fan. The company name is "Aeternum Cryptographic". :-)

[serenitys]

I'm sure someone's probably suggested it already but isn't there an option for you to set up a crowdfunding/kickstarter campaign to generate funds and wider interest?

PS those protos are awesome. I'm definitely watching the progress.

[crazy_rabbit]

I'm sure someone's probably suggested it already but isn't there an option for you to set up a crowdfunding/kickstarter campaign to generate funds and wider interest?

PS those protos are awesome. I'm definitely watching the progress.

I've been thinking about this quite a bit. I'm very supportive of crowd funding, as I think it allows you to do some fantastic things, but it's a bit tricky at the same time. I've been talking with some mastercoin people about crowdfunding a-la MaidSafe with the mastercoin protocol. It seems more 'bitcoin' then doing a kickstarter after all, but what should I promise people in exchange? Devices? Shares in the company? Coupons redeemable at some future point? The bitcoin community can be very supportive, but I think people at this point will want to actually get something in return- it's hard to know what that should be.

[asimoshe]

Sounds like a quality product, no doubt it would benefit Bitcoin market security and will add another dimension of security to people who are not confident about Bitcoin.

Good luck mate, for sure I will try it when it comes out