This morning when I was thinking about what to write today I had security in mind and especially given the well-publicised (North Korean?) hack of Binance that led to a significant theft of crypto-assets. I am not in a position to comment on that specifically, and plenty of other people - people far more knowledgable and qualified than I - already have. So, if you are interested please go and have a look. Of course, I've read articles (and especially on here) and I have nothing to add to what has already been written.
To write my own post which in fact would be piggy-backing information gleaned on here would feel like stealing tips from those who put the research and the work into their articles - which represents a moral failure on my part and is tantamount to stealing. So I am not going to do it!
However, this train of thought led me directly to what has been called Security by Obscurity and on one hand it is the most secure, but at the same time the most vulnerable. I am going to create a visual image to illustrate what I mean before moving on.
Back in the days when I was a younger teenager and before I had my own key, it was common practice (among my peers too) for parents to leave a key hidden somewhere near the door in an agreed place. This place would often be under a doormat or a plant pot or a stone. The teenager would then come home and simply let themselves in.
This is an incredible risk and the fact that so many people were doing it meant that a malicious person could target a home and easily locate a key just by looking in the most obvious of places. Once in such a person could do what they liked. I don't know if times were better then, whether we were more innocent or more naive.
The more you read about people doing this the more you come to realise that it is actually stupid!
However, there are some principles here. Security is necessary, but at the same time there is a need for access. In terms of online security some experts talk about C.I.A. principles:
Confidentiality - keeping sensitive data secret and preventing unauthorised access or disclosure.
Integrity - that information is complete, whole and not compromised in anyway
Access - that data contained within is only accessible to those who need it and in a timely way.
So in the given example where does Security by Obscurity fit in?
Well, very simply, instead of hiding the key in close proximity to your door why not leave it in a similar place, but at your neighbours? It is a place that a malicious person is less likely to look and even if they do they will "have the wrong key" (transfer that thought to the Crypto-Verse) and be denied access.
While obviously not too secure, the obscurity element massively increases the security, simply by segregating and removing the direct connection between access and entry.
To some extent 2FA achieves this segregation, but I wonder in what ways such a principle can be applied to our crypto-assets.
I am not recommending this as a method, far from it, but it could provide an additional layer of security if for example you keep your seed phrase somewhere really obscure.
Of course the challenge then is to remember where you put it! lol
As always stay safe and well my friends.
