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DIY · Safety
How to test without risking your file
Trying it yourself is reasonable in many cases. What isn’t reasonable is trying in a way where one mistake leaves you with no wallet. These five rules mean that, whatever happens, you can always get back to the starting point.
The five rules
- Three copies, two media, one separate place. Copy the file or folder to a USB stick, to an external drive, and leave it where it is too. The original is never touched again.
- Always work on a working copy. If it gets corrupted, damaged or modified by the tool, take another copy and start again.
- Check the copies before starting. Make sure they are the same size as the original. A 0-byte file is a failed copy, and it happens more than you would think.
- Disconnect from the internet while handling sensitive material, if the tool works offline. The good ones do.
- Don’t run anything you didn’t download yourself from the official site, typing the address by hand.
Rule three is the one most people skip and the one that prevents the most heartbreak. Checking the copy exists and is the same size takes ten seconds. Discovering months later that your only copy was empty has no fix.
How to test passwords without destroying anything
- On desktop wallets, testing passwords deletes nothing and locks nothing. You can get it wrong as many times as you like.
- On hardware wallets, attempts do run out. There you don’t test wildly: you write the list first.
- If a tool asks to modify the file, stop and ask why. Testing passwords is a read-only operation.
- If a program offers to «repair» or «convert» your wallet, do it only on a copy and only knowing exactly what it does.
The final check
When you manage to open it, don’t consider the case closed yet. The most important step remains: move the funds to a new wallet, created by you, with a new phrase written on paper. During the recovery your material has been in copies, in working folders and possibly on more than one device. That wallet is no longer a place to leave money.
And afterwards, clean up: delete the working copies, the temporary files and any digital note of passwords or words. What you no longer need shouldn’t keep existing. It is exactly what I do when closing a case.