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Safety · What to share
What data is safe to share and what isn’t (table)
To know whether your case has a way out, information is needed — but no secrets are. This table separates the two once and for all, and it works with me or with anyone else.
The table
| Data | Safe to share? |
|---|---|
| One of your addresses | Yes: it is public |
| A transaction identifier | Yes: it is public |
| A screenshot of the balance | Yes |
| Which app created the wallet | Yes |
| The year you created it | Yes |
| How many words are missing and where | Yes |
| The approximate password length | Yes |
| The style of your passwords | Yes, better spoken than written |
| The file’s parameters (scrypt, rounds) | Yes |
| A master public key (xpub) | With care: it reveals your history |
| The complete wallet file | Not during an assessment |
| One or several words of your phrase | No |
| The complete phrase | Never, to anyone |
| The password | Never, to anyone |
| A private key | Never, to anyone |
The three rows that need explaining
- The master public key. It can’t spend, so it isn’t a theft risk. But it reveals every address and your whole history, present and future. That is privacy, not money. Share it with whoever is assessing your case; don’t post it on a forum.
- The complete file. Without the password it is useless, but there is no reason to hand it over during an assessment: the parameters are enough. There comes a time to work with it, and by then there is a contract.
- One or several words of the phrase. Even a few reduce a thief’s work. And above all: they are not needed at all for an assessment. If someone asks for «just a few», you know what that is.
The rule that sums up the whole table: share what describes your case, not what opens it. Everything in the top half describes; everything in the bottom half opens.
And one thing about sensitive material
When the time comes to do the real work, some data is genuinely needed. How it is handled matters as much as how it is requested: it isn’t written in emails, isn’t left in chats and isn’t stored anywhere afterwards. What can be spoken is spoken; what isn’t needed isn’t asked for.
If someone asks for anything from the bottom half of the table in a first contact, the conversation ends there. There is no exception, no urgency that justifies it and nobody official enough to skip it.