{"id":13165,"date":"2021-11-11T22:35:12","date_gmt":"2021-11-11T22:35:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ci0292053ee0002559"},"modified":"2021-11-11T22:35:12","modified_gmt":"2021-11-11T22:35:12","slug":"multisig-setup-saves-bitcoin-stack-from-home-burglary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/business\/multisig-setup-saves-bitcoin-stack-from-home-burglary","title":{"rendered":"Multisig Setup Saves Bitcoin Stack from Home Burglary"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Bitcoin user Callum McArthur\u2019s house was broken into last month, and the burglars stole his hardware wallet and recovery words which stored his bitcoin stack. However, even though the criminals managed to get away with McArthur\u2019s devices, they didn\u2019t know that the keys they took were part of a multisig setup<\/a>. As a result, the burglars couldn\u2019t spend one satoshi, and McArthur\u2019s stack was left intact.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to diversify your security for your most important investments, it\u2019s extraordinarily important. And that\u2019s exactly what multisig is doing,\u201d McArthur said<\/a> while sharing his story on the By the Horns podcast. \u201cOtherwise you\u2019re generally talking about 10 to 15 years of your hard labor…and the possibility of that all being gone…you\u2019re not getting those years back. Don\u2019t skip on security.\u201d<\/p>\n

McArthur used a 2-of-3 multisig service from Casa, a bitcoin services company, in which he held the majority of the keys and had Casa function as a backup provider. The company was central to helping him deactivate the robbed key and switch his setup to restore complete control over his funds after the burglary.<\/p>\n

\u201cProvided that I purchase myself a new Ledger, deactivate that previous key, sync up my new key with Casa…I can get back to using my Ledger and my phone,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s an easy process, they walk you through every step of the way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite protecting against burglaries, multisigs<\/a> and physical separation of keys are essential to protect against another attack vector \u2014<\/em> $5 wrench attacks<\/a>. In this type of attack, the criminal leverages cheap tools to torture a victim until they comply and reveal the passwords or keys to access the funds.<\/p>\n

Last week, a tech millionaire in Madrid had his bitcoin stack stolen after a group of criminals invaded his house and forced him to hand over control to an online account, Newsweek<\/em><\/a> reported, effectively stealing millions in BTC.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Even though burglars managed to steal the victim\u2019s hardware wallet, his funds were still safe because of his multisig setup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2572,"featured_media":3324,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[453,199,356],"class_list":{"0":"post-13165","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-casa","9":"tag-hardware-wallets","10":"tag-multisig"},"author_data":{"id":2572,"name":"Namcios","nicename":"namcios","avatar_url":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/pfp-96x96.png"},"featured_image_url":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/img_6298.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2572"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13165"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13165\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3324"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bitcoinmagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}