5 ms·

Can just be keyrotation

gruez 6y ago
but why would you need to rotate a cold wallet (presumably) key? Key rotating makes sense for your password or tls keys, because they're used on a regular basis on networked computers that can possibly be compromised. But if the private key is stored on an airgapped computer (or paper wallet) there would be no advantage. If anything pulling the computer out to do the signing presents more danger because there's opportunity for your house to be raided (by police or rival criminals) while you're doing the signing.
- whyrusleeping 6y ago
  Someone might want to take more precautions generating keys for $1 billion vs $1 million. I'm betting this person (or persons) generated keys in a more secure manner (potentially a sharded key, or using hardware wallets) than the original keys, which may have been generated on a non-airgapped device.
  - Scoundreller 6y ago
    Iunno, if I had $1b sitting around, I’d like it to be in 1000 different wallets each containing $1m. With $1b, I’d rather risk losing 10% than having a 10% chance of losing all of it.
    - gchokov 6y ago
      Well, but you don’t.
      - ineedasername 6y ago
        I don't have a mansion but I can reasonably assert, in a productive conversation, how I might secure such a property.
    - lacker 6y ago
      That sounds like such a pain to access, though. Better to just have it in 10 wallets of $100m, plus one wallet with a few mil that you use for actual transactions.
- Robelius 6y ago
  Could you explain what key rotation is? First time I’ve seen this term.
  - benburleson 6y ago
    In general, just generating a new key to access the secure data.
  - _jal 6y ago
    Very briefly, secrets should have maximum lifetimes. This is for multiple reasons - someone could be brute-forcing it; algorithms are regularly found to be less secure than initially thought; keys leak over time. Any secret protecting anything you care about should be rotated. The schedule is dictated by specifics.
- robocat 6y ago
  > Key rotating makes sense for your password or tls keys, because they're used on a regular basis on networked computers that can possibly be compromised. Surely key rotation only makes sense if the time between each rotation is much much less than the expected time between compromise and theft. In high value situations, an attacker is highly motivated to ensure they steal Bitcoin very quickly after compromise. Especially becaus the clock is ticking until the compromise is discovered and mitigated.
- vmception 6y ago
  many people have the encrypted key pair and have been trying to brute force access for years. so either someone succeeded, or it got rotated by simply moving the coins to literally any other address. of course, both of these outcomes are indistinguishable which is part of the beauty of the system, especially if someone was actually trying to ride out statute of limitations or something else. they can still obfuscate their destination either way. if the source is illicit its money laundering, if the source is not illicit its just obfuscation, if done right the illicit source is never discovered having been replaced with a licit source.
  - simias 6y ago
    How did the encrypted keys leak?
    - vmception 6y ago
      I don't know from this article and other articles I've seen: > A file that some claimed was an encrypted bitcoin wallet containing the keys to the funds has been circulated in cryptocurrency communities for the past year, and – if it is what it was claimed to be – then a combination of brute computing power and good luck could have successfully decrypted the wallet.
      - 3ahrbd43 6y ago
        It likely didn’t really leak. It’s a trick/scam they play on the naive. One can replace the cleartext section in the wallet with a unrelated tx reference that doesn’t match the actual encrypted private key. The wallet will act like the real one (it will show the referenced tx in the UI) but even if you could decrypt the encrypted private key, it would be for the wrong pubkey.
        vmception 6y ago
        that's hilarious
        WanderPanda 6y ago
- lordnacho 6y ago
  Might just be a change of key infrastructure. If this was generated a long time ago, perhaps the owner wants something a bit more modern, like a HD wallet on hardware, something like that. More ergonomic and elegant than possibly holding on to a load of different keys.
  - Scoundreller 6y ago
    Agree with most, except the last bit: now they're managing the keys for their bitcoin, bitcoin cash and bitcoin gold (and maybe other forks?)
    - lordnacho 6y ago
      But with the HD wallets you can switch a field in the derivation path for each coin. Then one seed can give you different looking addresses for each chain, from the same device.

but why would you need to rotate a cold wallet (presumably) key? Key rotating makes sense for your password or tls keys, because they're used on a regular basis on networked computers that can possibly be compromised. But if the private key is stored on an airgapped computer (or paper wallet) there would be no advantage. If anything pulling the computer out to do the signing presents more danger because there's opportunity for your house to be raided (by police or rival criminals) while you're doing the signing.

whyrusleeping 6y ago
Someone might want to take more precautions generating keys for $1 billion vs $1 million. I'm betting this person (or persons) generated keys in a more secure manner (potentially a sharded key, or using hardware wallets) than the original keys, which may have been generated on a non-airgapped device.
- Scoundreller 6y ago
  Iunno, if I had $1b sitting around, I’d like it to be in 1000 different wallets each containing $1m. With $1b, I’d rather risk losing 10% than having a 10% chance of losing all of it.
  - gchokov 6y ago
    Well, but you don’t.
    - ineedasername 6y ago
      I don't have a mansion but I can reasonably assert, in a productive conversation, how I might secure such a property.
  - lacker 6y ago
    That sounds like such a pain to access, though. Better to just have it in 10 wallets of $100m, plus one wallet with a few mil that you use for actual transactions.
Robelius 6y ago
Could you explain what key rotation is? First time I’ve seen this term.
- benburleson 6y ago
  In general, just generating a new key to access the secure data.
- _jal 6y ago
  Very briefly, secrets should have maximum lifetimes. This is for multiple reasons - someone could be brute-forcing it; algorithms are regularly found to be less secure than initially thought; keys leak over time. Any secret protecting anything you care about should be rotated. The schedule is dictated by specifics.
robocat 6y ago
> Key rotating makes sense for your password or tls keys, because they're used on a regular basis on networked computers that can possibly be compromised. Surely key rotation only makes sense if the time between each rotation is much much less than the expected time between compromise and theft. In high value situations, an attacker is highly motivated to ensure they steal Bitcoin very quickly after compromise. Especially becaus the clock is ticking until the compromise is discovered and mitigated.
vmception 6y ago
many people have the encrypted key pair and have been trying to brute force access for years. so either someone succeeded, or it got rotated by simply moving the coins to literally any other address. of course, both of these outcomes are indistinguishable which is part of the beauty of the system, especially if someone was actually trying to ride out statute of limitations or something else. they can still obfuscate their destination either way. if the source is illicit its money laundering, if the source is not illicit its just obfuscation, if done right the illicit source is never discovered having been replaced with a licit source.
- simias 6y ago
  How did the encrypted keys leak?
  - vmception 6y ago
    I don't know from this article and other articles I've seen: > A file that some claimed was an encrypted bitcoin wallet containing the keys to the funds has been circulated in cryptocurrency communities for the past year, and – if it is what it was claimed to be – then a combination of brute computing power and good luck could have successfully decrypted the wallet.
    - 3ahrbd43 6y ago
      It likely didn’t really leak. It’s a trick/scam they play on the naive. One can replace the cleartext section in the wallet with a unrelated tx reference that doesn’t match the actual encrypted private key. The wallet will act like the real one (it will show the referenced tx in the UI) but even if you could decrypt the encrypted private key, it would be for the wrong pubkey.
      - vmception 6y ago
        that's hilarious
      - WanderPanda 6y ago
lordnacho 6y ago
Might just be a change of key infrastructure. If this was generated a long time ago, perhaps the owner wants something a bit more modern, like a HD wallet on hardware, something like that. More ergonomic and elegant than possibly holding on to a load of different keys.
- Scoundreller 6y ago
  Agree with most, except the last bit: now they're managing the keys for their bitcoin, bitcoin cash and bitcoin gold (and maybe other forks?)
  - lordnacho 6y ago
    But with the HD wallets you can switch a field in the derivation path for each coin. Then one seed can give you different looking addresses for each chain, from the same device.