Securing Your Cryptocurrency in 2022

What does it mean to secure your cryptocurrency?

We have all heard about the latest and greatest ways to trade cryptocurrency by now. And if you haven't, well, you'd better get on that. However, the uninitiated don't really tend to or need to worry too much about that one other aspect of cryptocurrency that simply cannot be overlooked: cryptocurrency security.

Experts in the field of cryptocurrency storage warn that you shouldn't try and get around the necessary research, particularly with regards to software and hardware wallets.

Crypto traders must remember that while the decentralized nature of cryptocurrency trading is definitely a major advantage on many levels, the fact that digital coins are decentralized means that if stolen, there is no way in the world you can retrieve your digital money again.

Moreover, if you think that there is no one out there who is trying to hack into your software wallet and steal your cryptocurrency, think again! Hackers of this day and age are extremely attracted to cryptocurrency since it can be stolen from victims far away in other countries over the internet. Often, hackers can be residing in countries that make extradition difficult, so even if they are identified, the risk of punishment is very low.

Therefore, if you have cryptocurrency of any kind, especially bitcoin, you will want to make sure you are doing everything in your power to secure your crypto in the safest possible manner. The first response to this security threat came from crypto exchanges themselves when they created vaults to hold the digital currency of investors on the exchange. However, this mechanism has shown itself to not be foolproof on several occasions.

Apart from headlining hacks on crypto exchanges where enormous amounts of digital currency were stolen from vaults, cybercriminals also attempt to steal cryptocurrency from the wallets of individual investors. In this case, there is a human element involved because although hackers have their malicious ways of getting what they want, they feed off their victims' vulnerability and naiveté through phishing scams and malware.

So, what's the best way to go about securing your cryptocurrency in 2021? Well, there are a total of two basic pointers we would like to establish.

For one thing, if you are looking at long-term storage of digital currency, you should most definitely be using a cold storage wallet. These are hardware devices that allow you to store your crypto offline, away from the prying eyes of malicious actors.  The upside and the downside of this option are one and the same: that the responsibility of securing your crypto falls solely on you.

If, however, you use cryptocurrency for daily online spending, you will need to store some of your crypto in a convenient location known as an online hot wallet. It's always smart to keep as little cryptocurrency as possible in hot wallets. However, what is even smarter is to ensure you are using strong passwords with multifactor authentication to make your hot wallet as secure as possible.

What makes cryptocurrency so revolutionary is that it gives power back to the people. However, this also means that malicious actors can exploit your vulnerabilities to steal your crypto and that no third-party entity can do anything about it. Therefore, securing your cryptocurrency in this day and age is entirely up to you.

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