Encrypting your Cryptos
You don’t need to pay a single dollar to secure your dollars.
In the nature of the decentralized monetary system, there have unfortunately been numerous times where people have lost life-changing amounts of money due to simply having a bit of their data stolen, however I believe this is still better than having it out of your control. It may come with its own risks and issues, but if we care about having a free and decentralized future, then I think it’s our responsibility to not only understand the nature of how our synthetic assets work, but also on how to protect them ourselves.
There is no such thing as a flawless system of ensuring that your assets are never stolen; only decreasing the likelihood. If you feel you aren’t up to the responsibility of keeping your assets secure, then the best alternative in most cases is probably a broker. The only problem with that is that brokers come with some limitations, such as not offering staking (as well as any DeFi activity) and having high deposit minimums. And even then, it is technically being looked over by other human beings, so even if they have a great track record, you’re still technically putting your money in the hands of other people.
A lot of people also like to use hardware wallets. They are an excellent resource, but personally I could never bring myself to use one because not only do I fear the idea of either losing it or having it stolen, but what a hardware wallet does is technically an automated and simplified version of what you can do on a secure computer as long as you’re careful.
But through a short series of free applications, both online and offline, you can create a practically fail-safe way to secure your private keys and pneumonic phrases so long as you don’t leave any traces along the way. This guide is designed for Windows users, but I believe most of these steps can be done on Mac and Linux as well.
Step 1: Basic Encoding and File Storage
This is the part most people are likely familiar with; getting a text document, copying down your private keys or seed phrases (or both) and saving it into a text document in a place people are unlikely to find. This one part can already have a few tweaks you should add to it when it comes to the way you copy it down. First of all, when you’ve copied the text into the text document, highlight all the text and Base64 Encode it, and do so at least twice. This is a commonly used quick way of encoding text and can be done entirely offline. The program I would recommend using for this is Notepad++ (although honestly, I’m sick of every single person using the same program. It’s not the only one out there!).
Before:
After:
And before you’re done with the encoding, make sure to close the tab for this text document on Notepad++ before closing the whole program. That way no metadata is saved.
Another thing you should do after that is to rename the file extension. No matter what you rename the file extension to (or if you just take away the extension as a whole), it will still be able to be opened on programs like Notepad++ to access the same data. In most cases, I would recommend something like a .dat or .dll file since that’s the kind of file nobody would think to try and open.
Another tip is to place that file in a folder that is full of files that appear just like it, thus it will be camouflaged and it won’t stand out. In this example, I made it look like a random configuration file in the folder of a video game I have installed. Also, of course, make sure that the name of the file doesn’t hint that it relates to crypto in any way. If it has the seed phrase to your Theta wallet, better name it FUNNY_MONKEY.DAT or something like that. Get creative! Although, that particular example I gave might stand out a bit… I named mine DefaultLinguistic.dat here.
Step 2: Creating an Encrypted File Container
Here comes the more mischievous stuff. There are a few programs that can turn any file you want into a mountable virtual hard drive partition that is password protected, and it’s designed so that it would be hard to even know that that file was a virtual hard disk at all. The program I use for creating and mounting these encrypted file containers is VeraCrypt (another trustworthy one for Windows users would be BitLocker, which comes pre-installed).
Now in the example I gave in Step 1, placing that file within the midst of those other game files like I did might have to be approached a bit differently in this case. Because now that “DefaultLinguistic.dat” file is no longer going to be the prime file we’re trying to hide.
Instead, we’re going to be putting that file inside another file’s encrypted container. First of all, when creating our encrypted file container, first create a new file of any kind (it doesn’t matter what, as long as it’s a new random file, such as a new text document). And make sure whatever file you use here contains no significant data that you’ll want to access again, because that data is going to be wiped after you turn it into a file container. In this case, I’ll just create another spoof .dat file: Editor.dat.
Now, after you’ve installed VeraCrypt, click on Create Volume, and then make sure Create an Encrypted File Container is selected before you click Next.
Next step:
Next step:
Make sure that you select the new file you created here; not the one that you put your seed phrases into. This is the step where you’re telling VeraCrypt what file you’re turning into your secret volume.
Next step:
Next step:
You’ll probably barely need 1 MB (Megabyte) for this kind of situation, but I think it’s a better idea to go to the KB section and type a random 3-digit number (so long as it’s at least a couple hundred) instead of just typing something like “1 MB”, because an exact file size of 1 MB might look a little bit suspicious and stand out.
Next step:
I would personally recommend getting used to memorizing at least one unusually long password, but either way, any password of your choice is required here. This will be the password you enter every time you wan to mount this virtual drive we’re creating.
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Next step:
This is VeraCrypt’s way of randomly generating a more random seed to make sure the volume can’t be decrypted by hackers. Just move your mouse around for 30 seconds or so, and that will add security to your volume. When you’re happy with how random it is, just click Format and you’ve finished creating your volume! Now, onto mounting it…
If VeraCrypt still shows the Volume Creation Wizard window, you can close out of it now. Go to the home window, select whatever Drive Letter you want it to be mounted as (doesn’t really matter), and then click Select File.
Now, go to the directory of the folder where you made your File Container, and select that file we turned into a secret container:
Next, you click Mount, type in the password that you gave for your container back when you were creating it, and press OK!
So long as you didn’t make any typos, it should mount the volume in a few seconds.
As you can see, VeraCrypt has mounted the file and turned it into the Local Disk of the Drive Letter I selected.
Now to do what this was meant for: Move the file that you stored your seed phrase/private keys in, and put it in this virtual drive! That way you have an already encrypted file within a whole encrypted volume, within another encrypted file!
Once again for extra security (in case someone found out about this secret drive partition), make a bunch of other files that look just like the important one in order to camouflage it.
And as long as you’re certain you have control over this new Volume you’ve created, you might want to delete the old copy of your text document with your seed phrases and make sure this volume is the only place you can find that data.
And once you’re done, all you have to do on VeraCrypt is to click the Dismount button, and then it’s left as if that secret volume you created was never there. If anything, go to Windows Explorer and go to the Quick Access section to make sure it didn’t list your recent files and folders, because it might have shown signs of the hidden drive or files relating to it. If so, just right click those files and click Remove from Quick Acccess:
Step 3: Cloud Storage; without the usual Cloud Storage Problems
Most people in these cases would recommend sticking to just your physical storage media, and I respect that in most cases. But what if you house burns down? What if you drop the USB stick you were keeping that partition on? Well, we all know Google loves to spy on everything apart from our brains, so Google Drive isn’t the greatest option, though it might seem convenient.
But there is a fairly simple alternative: crypt.ee! It’s an encrypted cloud storage service that has no access to your files or your login information. A free account gives you 100 MB, which is more than enough for this task. The creator, John Ozbay explains the site in this interview. Check out his awesome hairstyle!
After you sign up with your email, it gives you an Encryption Key, which can be anything you choose, although you should probably make it different than your original password. It’s like crypto in the sense that they have no knowledge of your encryption key, and that if you lose it, it’s lost for good. The only difference is that in this case, it isn’t randomly generated; you can make the key whatever you want it to be.
Also, for another layer of security, I would recommend registering on Cryptee with a spoof email address. This is a trashy looking email address that’s designed to forward whatever email is sent to it to your real email. That way, you can receive ingoing emails from people and websites without them having any data on where you’re actually receiving it. A good free website that lets you make multiple spoof email addresses is SimpleLogin.
But if you want practically a guarantee that throughout this process of signing up and uploading your encrypted file container to this site can leave no traces, I would do something else before accessing the site: Picking the right VPN and connecting to the Tor Network.
VPNs have become very popular, but most people don’t know just how much they’re being lied to and ripped off. I subscribed to NordVPN for 2 years, but I decided to ditch it after I found out that they have a history of not genuinely caring about your privacy. It turns out that the free edition of ProtonVPN (created by the same creators of Protonmail) is actually more trustworthy and works almost as well as the paid service I had with NordVPN. I would recommend ProtonVPN as the best free VPN service right now. There is a VPN Chart created by Techlore that’s designed to compare the current VPNs and their different strengths and weaknesses.
But even with a VPN activated from ProtonVPN, it couldn’t hurt to add extra layers of protection, could it? Nowadays Brave Browser has made it pretty simple and convenient to connect to the Tor Network. Just click Alt+Shift+N after opening the browser if you didn’t already see it in the dropdown menu. I could demonstrate it myself, but I’m tired of making all these screenshots, so screw it! Or if you don’t want to use Brave, you can also download the Tor Browser Bundle.
But basically, connecting to Tor adds 3 more IP addresses to the one you already had spoofed from your VPN, so it’s liked having 4 VPNs at once. I just recommend this since it isn’t too hard to do. Just know that when you’re logging into Cryptee through Tor, it may make you go through an annoying CAPTCHA. Just push your brain through that torture for 20 seconds. But god, I hate CAPTCHAs…
But as long as you made sure you can log into your Cryptee account with your email, password, and encryption key, then you should be good to go! All you have to do then is drag on that file with the encrypted volume inside of it, and now you have it backed up on secure cloud storage! And once again, I would recommend uploading multiple similar-looking files in order to disguise it, just like we did in the previous two steps.
Another option for internet-based backup storage is a program called Syncthing. It’s a private and decentralized way to sync folders between multiple computers or phones without anyone prying in between. I don’t know as much about how to use it, but if you want another backup plan in case you have two different secure hard drives in different physical locations, running this program could prove very useful.
And that’s my guide on how to encrypt your seed phrases/private keys in 3 secure layers!
1. Base64 encode
2. Hide that file inside an encoded virtual disk
3. Backup that virtual disk volume on could storage without a trace
All at no cost; I hope this was helpful!
