Another cryptocurrency theft involving a hardware wallet.
An old wallet had worked without issue for eight years. After sitting unused for more than four years, it was replaced with a new wallet a month ago.
But just after the assets were transferred, all 59 ETH—worth about $146,800—were stolen.
The most important thing to note isn’t the amount lost, but the act of “switching wallets.”
Many people assume that if a wallet has been trouble-free for years, it must be secure.
But the fact that nothing went wrong in the past only means that past actions didn’t expose the risk.
As soon as you replace a device, generate a new recovery phrase, or grant new permissions, the security boundary has changed.
Assets that have been sitting idle for a long time can be especially vulnerable when being reorganized, because people may let their guard down.
So whenever you use a new device, make sure to verify the place of purchase, initialization process, source of the recovery phrase, and firmware status. If a device asks you to enter a pre-generated recovery phrase, stop using it immediately.
Moving assets from one wallet to another may look like a simple transfer, but in reality, it could be an entirely new security incident.
An old wallet had worked without issue for eight years. After sitting unused for more than four years, it was replaced with a new wallet a month ago.
But just after the assets were transferred, all 59 ETH—worth about $146,800—were stolen.
The most important thing to note isn’t the amount lost, but the act of “switching wallets.”
Many people assume that if a wallet has been trouble-free for years, it must be secure.
But the fact that nothing went wrong in the past only means that past actions didn’t expose the risk.
As soon as you replace a device, generate a new recovery phrase, or grant new permissions, the security boundary has changed.
Assets that have been sitting idle for a long time can be especially vulnerable when being reorganized, because people may let their guard down.
So whenever you use a new device, make sure to verify the place of purchase, initialization process, source of the recovery phrase, and firmware status. If a device asks you to enter a pre-generated recovery phrase, stop using it immediately.
Moving assets from one wallet to another may look like a simple transfer, but in reality, it could be an entirely new security incident.