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I have an electrum wallet and have exported the Master Public Key. What level of security should I use for the MPK? Should I keep it offline? Can I keep it in plaintext in an online computer? Back it up somewhere ( gmail / dropbox )?
Do I need to secure my Master Public Key generated from an Electrum wallet?
Answers
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The xpubkey (your master public key) is not something you need to export.
What you need to store is your seed value for the Electrum wallet. With this it can regenerate you the xpubkey.
The xpubkey is not really useful unless you are providing it to someone who intends to make multiple payments to you. If this is the case then make sure only that individual or business will be sending you funds to the address set as once the xpubkey is shared it allows them to see all addresses down that chain.
I have exported my seed, saved it off and stored it in a safe secure place. What I am wondering is if need to secure my Master Public Key. Do I need to keep it secret? – browep – 2017-03-13T18:24:48.303
1I'm not that familiar with electrum, but I'm pretty sure something named xpubkey is a public key, not a private key. If it is private, that's a very poor name. – Jestin – 2017-03-13T19:19:42.180
1As I said, you wont loose funds by sharing it but its does harm your privacy with that specific wallet. – MaxSan – 2017-03-15T15:17:11.893
AFAIK Nobody can steal your bitcoins using your Public Key. no bitcoins can be spent in a wallet without the Private Key / seed. – vsync – 2017-11-01T18:42:14.587