The Book of Bitcoin

Hardware Wallets

For secure storage and spending of Bitcoin, it's commonly recommended that a hardware wallet be used. A hardware wallet is a dedicated device to store private keys and sign transactions, so as to limit the vulnerabilities inherent in a normal computer's shared and multipurpose platform. Hardware wallets have an advantage over paper wallets in that they can be used interactively, without the need to place funds on a multi-purpose computing device. Since hardware wallets are custom-designed to store secure data, they use chip features to protect any leak of private keys.

Digital Bitbox

The Digital Bitbox hardware wallet is produced by a Swiss company that employs the well known Bitcoin Core developer Jonas Schnelli. The wallet features modern standards such as an HD seed, with a swappable wallet configuration powered by micro-SD cards. The Digital Bitbox is capable of working in tandem with a smartphone to power multiple independent device signature support.

KeepKey

The KeepKey wallet is a hardware wallet that features a large OLED display to make it easy to verify transaction details that the device is signing. KeepKey acts as a standard modern HD hardware wallet, featuring a secure PIN that locks when a brute force attempt is made.

Ledger

The Ledger wallet is actually a series of hardware devices with varying capabilities. Although Ledger does have a device with a screen, most Ledger devices are simply USB pluggable devices that act as multi-signature signing tokens. Industry standard security practices suggest that multiple factors are used when authenticating identity: something you know like a passphrase, or something you are like a biometric proof, and something you have like a Bitcoin signing device. Ledgers are designed to act as that signing device.

TREZOR

One of the first hardware wallets TREZOR has found enduring popularity as a secure location for Bitcoin storage. TREZOR's developers worked to create an advanced HD wallet based on BIP 32, and to standardize their advances in BIP 44. This HD wallet allows funds to be fully recovered based on a paper seed, and the increased standardization of the seed means that the seed can also be used outside of the TREZOR in the case of device loss or breakage.

TREZOR has various advanced security features, including a PIN protection system that randomizes the key entry location to foil key logging, and an encryption pass phrase system to provide for multiple storage zones that can be used in case of coercion, or to guard against physical theft by someone who knows the PIN.