Keeping Bitcoin wallet offline / Dogecoin hashrate wallet

The safest way to store bitcoins is in an offline wallet. With Bitcoin the tradeoff for eliminating banks is a that the user is responsible for backing up and securing their wallet.

A wallet is a collection of Bitcoin addresses. The addresses are pair of cryptographic keys, a public key and a private key. The public key is related to the Bitcoin address and other people can know your public address. The PRIVATE key, on the other should stay PRIVATE. This is the key to your funds.

The PRIVATE keys must stay PRIVATE.

If the private key is lost you cannot recover the bitcoins, ever. If the private key is saved to media and that media fails (hard drive, thumb drive, unreadable CD, etc.) you cannot recover the bitcoins.

If someone copies your private key they can take your bitcoins and it is highly unlikely you will ever know who did it. Also, they transfer coins from your wallet at any time in the future.

If you buy physical bitcoins you must trust the seller because they have the private key. If a hologram is used the person placing the hologram on the physical item has the private key, etc. This is not recommended for long term storage because there is reason to trust another entity.

One way to store an offline wallet is to use a computer that never connects to the Internet. An old computer, old laptop, etc. can be used as long as it work along with a thumb drive and you can connect it to a printer. This does not mean a computer temporarily disconnected from the Internet, it means a computer that NEVER gets connected to the Internet.

-On the computer connected to the Internet download and copy it to the thumb drive.

-Install Bitcoin Armory on the computer that never gets connected to the internet.

-Create a wallet and then follow the direction to create a “watch only” wallet and copy it to the thumb drive. A “watch only” wallet can receive funds but does not include the private keys so funds cannot be spent. If the computer with the watch-only wallet gets hacked the funds cannot be stolen.