Bitcoin Q&A: Hot vs. Cold Wallets
Channel: aantonop
Date: 2017-05-11

The dangers of custodial accounts; not your keys, not your money. Security practices for long-term vs. short-term storage, trading, and transacting. I don't leave any currency (crypto or fiat) in an exchange for longer than 15 minutes. I use these cryptocurrencies to pay my bills, so I transact very often. So far, I've only ever lost small amounts of bitcoin through stupid mistakes.

Chapters
0:00 How do you, in practice, use bitcoin both as a long term store value and something that you transact with?
0:45 I don't leave money on exchanges
2:03 Hot and cold wallets
4:12 I've lost small amounts of bitcoin

1. Don't leave your money on exchanges longer than you have to. If you day-trade, make sure you understand the risk that entails.

2. Organise a tiered storage system of hot and cold wallets, factoring in the amount of bitcoin you're storing, how you plan to use it (soon or not for a long time), and what security risks you're willing to take with each tier.

3. Use cold storage (i.e. paper wallets) for large amounts or for bitcoins you don't plan on using for a longer period of time.

4. Use hardware wallets that are PIN or password-protected 

5. Use multi-signature multi-party or multi-factor wallets for carrying out your weekly business transactions.

6. Use hot wallets (ex. mobile wallets) for petty cash, or if you are the Oprah of cryptocurrency.

This is part of a keynote talk which took place at the Blockchain Africa Conference on March 2nd 2017 at the Focus Rooms in Johannesburg, South Africa: http://blockchainafrica.co/speakers/andreas-m-antonopoulos/

Watch the full talk here: https://youtu.be/SMEOKDVXlUo

Testimony for the Australian Senate here: https://youtu.be/XotOwt8bTeI

RELATED:
How to get people to care about security - https://youtu.be/Ji1lS9NMz1E
Welcome to TrustNet - https://youtu.be/Rrj8sjHJthU
Hardware, Software, Trustware - https://youtu.be/Etyjc1JdmFU

Andreas M. Antonopoulos is a technologist and serial entrepreneur who has become one of the most well-known and well-respected figures in bitcoin.

Follow on Twitter: @aantonop https://twitter.com/aantonop
Website: https://antonopoulos.com/

He is the author of two books: “Mastering Bitcoin,” published by O’Reilly Media and considered the best technical guide to bitcoin; “The Internet of Money,” a book about why bitcoin matters.

THE INTERNET OF MONEY, v1: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Internet-Money-collection-Andreas-Antonopoulos/dp/1537000454/ref=asap_bc?ie=UTF8

MASTERING BITCOIN: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mastering-Bitcoin-Unlocking-Digital-Cryptocurrencies/dp/1449374042

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