Border Wallets – a new way to quickly and reliably memorize Bitcoin seed phrases | Hacker News Reader

Border Wallets – a new way to quickly and reliably memorize Bitcoin seed phrases

borderwallets.com

14 pointsclay-dreidels11 comments

This falls into the general category of brain wallets.

https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Brainwallet

I once generated a Bitcoin private key with a SHA-256 hash of a pop song lyric. Within 3-days the roughly $100 I sent to that wallet, as a test, was drained.

Entropy matters.

We explain the differences between Border Wallets and brain wallets here https://www.borderwallets.com/docs/faq

BIP39 isn't perfect, but being able to relatively independently of all other information recover someone's wallet (next of kin, etc.) from some words is very nice. This system complicates things a lot -- a grid of custom construction which will possibly not be stored, ambiguity in specifying the graphical pattern, etc.

Border Wallets is built using BIP39, and is designed to make memorising and transporting seed phrases across borders more secure and much easier for people.

Secure grid generation is provided by the Entropy Grid Generator tool, and the wallet(s) users create with it can be used in conjunction with existing backup methods if desired for when this solution needs to be invoked. We cover various use cases on our website, which also includes a full video demo which is easy to follow.

As for grid storage, there are several options for that:

1. Physical print

2. Digital storage

3. Encrypted digital storage (native encryption is a feature within the tool)

4. Recovery phrase for deterministic grids using 12 words - which provides an additional layer of security against evil maid (or border guard) attacks, as well as the option for decoys

5. Gridception (explained on our website)

Do I understand this correctly that you need to safely store your random grid since only the pattern is in your head? Losing the grid would then essentially mean you can't access your keys anymore even though someone else also can't. But maybe I overlooked something. Will take another look tomorrow.

However, I want to mention the technique of making up a story to remember the seed words. I found this to be fairly easy so I am not sure how this grid can be more useful than that.

But still a very cool and interesting idea! Thanks for sharing. (You even made me create a HN account to post my first comment)

Yes, you are correct - you need to store your grid and you can do that via a physical print, digital storage (including a native encryption option), and a recovery phrase for deterministic grids (12 words). The latter provides the means to storage the grids in the same way you would a normal seed phrase, but with an added layer of security against evil maid attack. The provides the ability to use a decoy too. Gridception is also an option, explained on our website.

The tutorial is quite long, so it's possible I missed this information somewhere. But what I would like to see is a breakdown like "If you have X bits of entropy in your seed phrase, a border wallet puts Y bits of that into the grid and Z bits of that into your memorized pattern." This would make it clear how much security you're gaining over just writing down the seed phrase (Z bits worth).

We cover that question on our FAQs here: https://www.borderwallets.com/docs/faq#Q3

It's hard for me to meaningfully distinguish the advantage of this v. e.g

1) "half" is six words you memorize

2) "other half" is a long annoying non-memorizable string that must be written down?

Am I missing something?

I am also confused on that and I am fine with writing things down. What are we trying to solve here? Half the key phrase in one place, half in another if we want extra security.

Writing down seed phrases exposes them to an evil maid (or border guard) attack.

Border Wallets offers a new way of storing, memorising and transporting Bitcoin seed phrases for people who:

- have difficulty/concerns with securely caching physical seed backups (evil maid attack)

- want to memorise their seed words but struggle to do so (e.g. the 15% of the global population who are dyslexic)

- want to carry their seed words with them at all times

- have limited access to trusted 3rd parties

- live in areas of conflict, war zones, etc.

- regularly travel or move around

- have no permanent fixed abode.

https://www.borderwallets.com/docs

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