This content originally appeared on Level Up Coding - Medium and was authored by Dmytro Spilka
After months of inactivity, the Bitcoin bull market appears to have finally resumed with the world’s most famous cryptocurrency breaking its all-time high once again in late October. The BTC price rally appears to have set investors up for a frenetic end to 2021 as the market undergoes more wild price movements. However, with higher appreciating assets comes more unwanted interest from cybercriminals.
According to Markets Insider, 32 incidents of hacks and fraud, amounting to a total value of $2.99 billion have already taken place in 2021 — putting the volume of crime on course to break the record of 38 cases reported across 2020. Furthermore, this represents a significant 40.7% rise over 2019.
(Image: Statista)
As we can see from the chart above, the number of blockchain wallet users has accelerated to nearly 80 million following Bitcoin’s widely reported price rally in late 2020 and early 2021.
However, rising interest among investors looking to buy and hold cryptocurrency invariably means that hacker interest in accessing crypto through illegal means is also growing.
With this in mind, cryptocurrency investors must remain alert when accessing their assets and setting up transactions with them. Fortunately, there are a number of measures that you can take in order to maintain as much control as possible over your crypto assets. Let’s take a deeper look at some easily actionable approaches that you can use to ensure that your Bitcoin stays by your side:
Tap into the Power of Cold Wallets
If you’re serious about keeping your cryptocurrency safe and have a significant amount of wealth invested into crypto assets, utilising cold storage options are the safest way to protect your investments.
Simply put, cold wallets are offline storage spaces that make it impossible for hackers to steal your assets.
These wallets store a user’s address and private key somewhere that’s not connected to the internet and typically features software that accompanies the hardware so that users can still see their portfolio without putting their private key at risk.
Hardware wallets typically come in the form of a USB drive that stores private keys securely. This gives it a great advantage compared to online ‘hot’ wallets because it will remain unaffected by viruses or vulnerable software that connected devices may come into contact with.
The open-source nature of cold wallets also means that its level of security can be determined by peers, rather than a company seeking to primarily leverage sales.
Cold wallets are the most secure way of storing BTC and various other crypto assets. However, it’s important to note that they may require a little knowledge to set up and may seem a little complex for beginners.
Utilise a VPN When Making Transactions
Utilising a VPN significantly improves your crypto security from a privacy perspective. Although Bitcoin isn’t anonymous, the currency can be pseudonymous, and although KYC/AML verification can make your financial activities easy to track on the public ledger, VPN’s can keep your identity safe.
Strong, privacy-oriented VPNs help you to protect your identity from whoever wants to track you, whether it’s hackers, governmental agencies or other shady third-parties. Fundamentally, it’s impossible for anyone to steal your money if they don’t know it’s you who it belongs to — and for this reason, VPNs are an excellent tool for keeping your finances secure.
However, it’s also worth noting that most cryptocurrency protocols are designed with a great level of security in place with end-to-end encryption present. This means that it’s extremely difficult for anyone to intercept the data that you send unless you’re already exposed to security vulnerabilities. By tapping into a VPN service to deliver an added layer of security when you use your crypto assets you can make your transactions virtually watertight.
Beware of Phishing Attacks
One of the most common vulnerabilities in the world of cryptocurrency investing comes in the form of phishing attacks.
As crypto becomes more popular, more hackers will find the motivation to target investors with mobile phishing campaigns designed to mimic ingesting apps as a means of stealing your login information, according to Hank Schless, a senior manager of security solutions at Lookout.
These social engineering attacks can originate from just about anywhere via a smartphone — whether it’s in the form of text messages, social media, third party web pages or email.
“Beyond phishing, there are also malicious mobile apps that have the hidden ability to log your keystrokes or watch the activity on your screen,” Schless adds. “Considering the amount of data we trust to those devices, they are the most important to secure.”
As the cryptocurrency bull run gains fresh life in Q4 of 2021, it’s inevitable that we’ll see scores of fresh investors arriving on the market to buy their first assets. With this new attention will come fresh security threats. It’s imperative that we remain vigilant and alert to ensure that our investments never fall into the wrong hands.
3 Essential Ways to Keeping Your Crypto Safe Throughout the Bull Market was originally published in Level Up Coding on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.
This content originally appeared on Level Up Coding - Medium and was authored by Dmytro Spilka
Dmytro Spilka | Sciencx (2021-10-28T02:31:37+00:00) 3 Essential Ways to Keeping Your Crypto Safe Throughout the Bull Market. Retrieved from https://www.scien.cx/2021/10/28/3-essential-ways-to-keeping-your-crypto-safe-throughout-the-bull-market/
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