Handling Your Own Keys
From seed phrases and HD wallets to hardware wallets, PSBTs, descriptors, message signing and inheritance.
8 posts
- 1IdeasIntermediate
Twelve Words That Hold Every Bitcoin You Own
How 12 or 24 words stand in for an unlimited number of Bitcoin keys. BIP-39 mnemonics, BIP-32 HD wallets, derivation paths, and the practical rules for backing up a seed safely.
- 2Articles
Lose These 12 Words and Your Bitcoin Is Gone Forever
A deep technical guide to Bitcoin seed phrases - BIP-39 entropy, HD wallet derivation (BIP-32/44/84), passphrase protection, and battle-tested storage methods.
- 3Articles
Online Wallet or Locked Vault, Pick the Right One for Your Bitcoin
A comprehensive comparison of cold storage and hot wallets for Bitcoin - hardware wallet reviews, air-gapped signing, multisig setups, and the optimal storage strategy for every level.
- 4ArticlesIntermediate
Coldcard, Jade, Trezor, Ledger: A Security Model Comparison
A comparison of four hardware wallets from the perspective of attack surface, security model, and software transparency. Evaluated against actual disclosed vulnerabilities and design decisions rather than marketing copy.
- 5ArticlesIntermediate
A Hardware Wallet Demands the Whole Previous Transaction
The format that makes air-gapped wallets and multisig actually work. The six roles of BIP-174, what a signing device is required to verify, the attack that lies to offline devices about the fee, and how Taproot ended it.
- 6ArticlesIntermediate
The Keys Alone Will Not Find the Vault
A seed phrase restores keys and nothing else. Which addresses those keys produce is decided by a single line called an output descriptor. An experiment where the same three keys yield five different first addresses, how to read a descriptor and its eight-character checksum, the multisig case where a threshold of seeds still cannot open the vault, and how to back it all up.
- 7ArticlesIntermediate
Proof of Ownership Without Moving a Coin
Signing a message with a Bitcoin address's private key shows that you control the address without moving a single coin. From the 2011 signmessage to BIP-137 and BIP-322, completed in 2026, plus what a signature cannot prove and how exchanges verify self-custody wallets.
- 8Articles
What Happens to Your Bitcoin if You Die Tomorrow
A comprehensive guide to Bitcoin inheritance planning - covering multisig schemes, Shamir's Secret Sharing, timelocked transactions, and practical steps to ensure your Bitcoin survives you.