There are a lot of myths going around for every choice you have for wallets, from Hot Wallets being easily hacked to Cold Wallets being unhackable... Way too many uninformed decisions are made when they might not have had to be. To start this off I'd like to state one thing, Cold Wallets are always better than Hot Wallets, so buying that Ledger or Trezor is always a good investment, especially if you're holding a lot of crypto or you plan on buying a lot. This fact just comes down to one being more reachable reachable than the other and the price difference. A person would have to physically be there to get to your hardware wallet but could theoretically get to your app wallet virtually with no real risk involved.
For anyone that doesn't know:
Cold Wallets = Hardware wallets = USB wallets that are physical
Hot Wallets = App wallets = Online wallets that are virtual
A lot of people downplay how safe hot wallets actually are. Even tho they are more susceptible to people attempting to steal your assets, most hot wallets have complex encryption systems that can only be decrypted by the apps themselves and in cases like MetaMask, your seed phrase never leaves your app so there is no way in which someone that may have gotten a hold of your network connection could access your wallet. The only realistic way to get into your account would be if they got remote control over your device and also had the pin/password or whatever other verification method you have. And that isn't something that is easy to do or common whatsoever. This doesn't mean you're completely safe as there is still a minuscule chance that this could happen and there could always be a bug or some other security breach in the system that has yet to be discovered.
There are also people that think Cold Wallet with a fingerprint scanner is the best possible security. The thing is, it is easier to get your fingerprint, be it knocking you out, cutting off your finger... or who knows what other method, than it is to make you confess your pin. Other than that, your cold wallets info never even gets to the internet so it's safe from all the external forces that might somehow get through hot wallets. Physically accessing your cold wallet is still a possibility but that is infinitely harder to do, especially if you do not disclose your crypto investment or your possession of a hardware wallet.
Note that Hot Wallets can essentially be extremely safe if the person using them is just the same. You don't visit shady sites, click unknown links or download random programs. It comes down to not being dumb, but that is sometimes hard to do on the internet with just how much we use it at times. In that case it should be a note of caution for all of us to be more aware of what sites we visit and which activities we use our devices for.
A thing that people often say is that you cold wallets should be used for long term holding while hot wallets should be used for trading or short term investments. And this is pretty much correct, you don't have to do it but it is a possible way to use these resources.
That's it from me, hopefully you now have a better understanding of wallet safety, if not I recommend you do some of your own research further to complete what I've hopefully started.
Thanks for reading!
