Proton hopes its new digital wallet will help Bitcoin "gain mainstream trust and acceptance."

Are there any that are cloud-hosted, secure, and private? My experience is limited, but I’ve never found an easy way in. I can’t imagine anyone who’s not tech-savvy getting started without walking through a minefield of scams.

Every now and then I look at options for how I might actually use crypto, and everything looks either outrageously scammy or way too much trouble. Pretty much every exchange I’ve looked at holds the keys to your account, and several have gone under or outright stolen their users’ funds.

The question is, when Proton embraces bitcoin, should it make me trust bitcoin more, or trust Proton less? I don’t know. I’m still skeptical. Their blog post is interesting, but also doesn’t answer a lot of questions. https://proton.me/blog/proton-wallet-launch

I mean, look at this:

Buy Bitcoin securely in 150+ countries

If you are new to Bitcoin, Proton Wallet also has integrations that make it easy to buy Bitcoin in 150+ countries, and we have also put together a comprehensive Bitcoin guide for newcomers.

That “comprehensive” guide spends three paragraphs talking about the “Blocksize War”, and makes absolutely no mention of how a user can actually buy bitcoin using Proton Wallet. WTF, Proton? Who is your target audience here exactly?

cloud-hosted, secure, and private

Until homeomorphic encryption becomes a thing, cloud can’t be secure or private.

every exchange I’ve looked at holds the keys to your account

Exchanges, are not wallets. You’re supposed to move the coins out of the exchange for safekeeping. If you can’t, then it’s not a crypto exchange, it’s an ETF peddler.

how a user can actually buy bitcoin using Proton Wallet.

Wallets, are not exchanges. They can link to exchanges, like Metamask does, but their core function is to hold your keys.

Until homeomorphic encryption becomes a thing, cloud can’t be secure or private.

Why do you need homeomorphic encryption? Isn’t client-side encryption good enough for most use cases?

Yes. Homomorphic encryption is for data processing, not data storage.

@cadekat@pawb.social
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I am aware. What processing is only possible in the cloud, and not locally?

Edit: My apologies, I didn’t realize you weren’t the same person I originally replied to. Please disregard!

@jarfil@beehaw.org
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Client-side is not cloud.

Yes, you can keep client-side reasonably secure. You can’t send the data for cloud processing and seriously expect much security or privacy… for now. Encrypt client-side and use cloud as storage… maybe; encryption algorithms also have a “best by” date.

My point is:

  • “Cloud hosted” can not be fully “secure and private” right now.
  • “With cloud storage”, has a “best by” date.
  • “Not cloud”… well, is not cloud 🙂

Letting anyone with the ability to switch the software without you noticing, anywhere near the keys controlling some Bitcoin funds, is a really bad idea.

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