We are Trezor, pioneers of the hardware wallet industry and creators of the world’s first hardware wallet, Trezor Model One (announced on Bitcoitalk.org in 2012).
Since day one, Trezor has adhered to an open source philosophy, with both the firmware and the hardware being fully open and free for everyone to build on. This choice has enabled a lot of innovation in the space, ensuring everyone around the world can hold and spend their bitcoin in a secure manner.
Trezor has contributed numerous BIPs and SLIPs to improve bitcoin:
To this day, Trezor remains at the forefront of bitcoin innovation, recently becoming the first hardware wallet to implement coinjoin, allowing you to improve your privacy directly from the security of your hardware wallet.
Matěj Žák is Trezor’s CEO
Hynek Jína is Trezor’s head of development, contributor to Stacker News
Josef Tětek is Trezor’s bitcoin analyst, contributor to Bitcoin Magazine
The AMA starts at 4pm CET / 10am ET (but you can post your questions earlier).
I think the recent fud is because you chose wasabi for coinjoin, when its said that wasabi partners with a leading anti-privacy webcrawler like chainalysis who acts for governments and big tech. That's something I'd expect from ledger perhaps, but didn't see that coming from trezor. I guess I'd like you to justify the use of wasabi and let us know (those of us who are worried) how using wasabi won't compromise our privacy.
The WabiSabi protocol is a proven open-source non-custodial solution. We evaluated the WabiSabi protocol, which is used by Wasabi Wallet and now Trezor, as the best in its category. Trezor coinjoin requires a coordinator with high liquidity and a high number of users for the best privacy gains and smooth user experience. zkSnacks coordinator has the highest volume and usage among existing solutions, which guarantees high privacy gains for the users.
Trezor coinjoin relies on Tor identities and block filters, so neither Trezor nor the coordinator run by zkSnacks can learn any sensitive data about the coinjoin participants.
On the contrary, coinjoin is a privacy tool that shields users from blockchain surveillance as it severs the links to past transactions.
And since its open protocol, anyone can start a new coordinator if they don't like the existing one, right?
Yes, I've been running one using BTCPay (no users yet though) with CoinJoin plugin!
yes, see the answer here: https://stacker.news/items/174375
Good technical explanation, I'll defer to those more knowledgeable than I at this point. That was what I heard from the grapevine
Are you considering any device that would integrate Trezor and Bitcoin/LN node? What's your approach to LN, any special plans?
This is something we are discussing right now in the R&D. Integrating hardware wallets and lightning network is tricky, because the former is almost always offline, while latter needs to be always online. I hope we will share something soon, so we could get opinion from the wider LN community.
Why did you choose Wasabi as CoinJoin and not other implementations like Samourai? Do you have plans to support PayJoin even if it's in beta?
Main advantage of Wasabi compared to Samourai is for us bigger liquidity and more simple experience that can ensure smooth service for all our users.
Payjoin is already prepare on Trezor firmware level.. However there are no plans currently for the implementation in Trezor Suite.
Great to hear hynek. Added to https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/PayJoin_adoption
Thanks for answer!
It is good to know PayJoin is coming for Trezor Suite :)
When will be Tropic Square security element chip in trezors?
Will you add option to change between wabisabi coordinators in coinjoin?
Thanks!
Regarding the coordinator question. Once a reputable coordinator with similar liquidity as the zkSnacks coordinator appears, we will consider it for inclusion. High enough liquidity is necessary for smooth operation of coinjoin rounds.
Tropic Square: The SE prototypes are being tested at the moment! No ETA on the production launch at the moment.
https://twitter.com/tropicsquare/status/1600469041432313857?s=20
What is the best solution for Bitcoin inheritance? Are you planning anything in that direction - maybe protocol level?
That’s a great question that should be asked and discussed more! Personally I believe that Shamir backup has qualities that are quite useful for inheritance planning. I have actually written an article on how to approach inheritance with Shamir backups: https://bitcoinmagazine.com/technical/protecting-bitcoin-shamir-backup. I think the crucial thing is to have some sort of “treasure map” that will become accessible to the family in the case something happens to you. Such treasure map would explain the nature of the inheritance and the location of the Shamir shares (not necessarily precise addresses to prevent theft if an “evil maid” discovers it). The precise inheritance plan is an individual thing, but I think there are some basic recommendations everyone should follow, as I describe in the linked article.
As for Trezor’s plans around this topic: we’d like to inform our users more about the use cases for Shamir backups such as this one.
What do you think about Stacker News? :)
I love it and it's a great showcase on what we can build with the power of bitcoin!
What’s something you think people commonly misunderstand about Trezor?
Are you in conjunction with Wasabi blacklisting bitcoin addresses through coinjoin?
We are not too happy about that, but we still believe that this is one of the the best existing solutions. zkSnacks coinjoins have the highest volume and user participation on the market and therefore we can achieve the best level of privacy.
Trezor with an optional coinjoin is a better product than Trezor without one. The act of blacklisting helps prevent coins that are under active surveillance from being included in the coinjoin, ensuring privacy is preserved for other participants.
Trezor coinjoin is fully optional, non-custodial and open source. If for any reason users don’t like this function, they don’t have to use it and nothing changes for them in terms of using their Trezor.
You do realize that this requires a trezor user to trust the criteria for blacklisting? Who makes this decision?
The coordinator makes its own judgment about potential service refusal. Contrary to some claims, neither an analytics company nor government agency has a say in the decision process. If users find out that their coins have been refused entry to the coinjoin, they remain in full control over their funds and can freely spend those coins.
90% of cash notes have traces of cocaine on them. Yet people still use the cash. This idea that a btc is "tainted" because it went through a marked wallet is extremely dangerous to the btc ethos of fungibility. It was set mistakenly by big brother and chainalysis themselves and I am very sad to see the industry going along with their little games.
In due time, most btc will have gone through a marked wallet at some point. Let's break this extremely stupid notion now once and for all.
Well said. Comments like "we're upset about it too" are disingenuous. Trezor adopted it, so don't blow smoke up my ass.
Agree. What should people do to break this notion?
Did people do something with cash that KYC didn't become problem? (Each note has ID I believe so you could do it too, right?)
Do you have any statistics on how many transactions are rejected for blacklisted utxos?
No, there are no statistics.
How many utxos are currently blacklisted?
So the answer is yes?
I bought a Trezor due to recoverable U2F support. It's great to know that I can safely cross a US/UK/AUS/Canadian border (with clean devices) and recover systems access on the other side.
Will this feature continue to be supported?
We plan to continue to support U2F.
Not only we plan to keep U2F support, we are also the first FIDO2 (successor of U2F) device with a display where you can see what credential is being used for authentication.
I know, it's awesome, I actually bought two devices because of this (one for backup)
thanks for building it!
Which Trezor devices support signing Payjoin transactions (I.e. those having some inputs that trezor will and will not not sign)? They belong on https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/PayJoin_adoption
HSM mode CoinJoin is a good move. Thanks for your dedication to bitcoin privacy.
Both devices (Trezor Model One and Trezor Model T) already support PSBT. However I don't know about good UI implementation so far.
Next time I have my hands on them I'll test with Sparrow which I know works with Coldcard. Know that design research is in the works at https://bitcoin.design/guide/case-studies/payjoin/
First of all, thanks for building these devices that are essential to anyone keeping the custody of their Bitcoins.
Today I have 3 questions for you, all related to "Multisig".
For organizations, relying on a hardware wallet is not practical and also has its security implication (most of them related to access-control). Multisig is a good solution for this problem, offers great flexibility and extra security. Having the ability to use Multisig together with hardware wallets would be perfect.
So the questions are:
It is possible to use multisignature transactions with your Trezor device and Electrum and other popular multisig wallets, however it is not yet implemented in Trezor Suite. There are no specific plans for multisig implementation in Trezor Suite.
Here is our co-founder @stick showing demo of the multisig usage with Trezor and Electrum Wallet: https://www.youtube.com/live/40mdFIAEh4E?feature=share&t=9760
Altough Trezor Suite does not support multisig natively, Bitcoin multisig is the first class citizen in Trezor. You can sign multisig transactions on Trezor with almost any wallet that supports both (multisig and Trezor), such as Bitcoin Core, Electrum, Sparrow, etc.
Would be cool to see a Bitcoin-only wallet meant to be used air-gapped (through SD cards and/or QRs) and well thought for multisig. Any plans of such a device?
What are the best practices for securing / hiding private keys? (products, DIY, etc.)
Hi, please have a look on these articles:
That describes the best practices. But feel free to ask more specific questions.
Any new hardware wallet models planned?
Yes! Currently 3.
Have you updated your release progress so Github and your official website will never have a different sha256sum for the builds again?
I was the one who raised a ticket about this in the past: https://github.com/trezor/trezor-suite/issues/6177#issuecomment-1237001816
Thanks for raising that up. It was already fixed last year.
How do you justify the disservice you are doing to the public by legitimizing unregistered and misrepresented securities tokens?
You are leading people astray and giving Fiat easy excuses to maintain their tyranny. Stop supporting scams.
We prefer to leave the decision of which cryptocurrency to use the discretion of our users. Our focus is to keep improving hardware wallet functionality and usability, which ensures user privacy and security when transacting bitcoin or any cryptocurrency our users are interested in. One such feature is the improved notification system in our Trezor Suite application to alert users whenever they may be interacting with scam tokens.
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I'm happy with that. I've lost money to shipcoins, now it's time for the next batches of people to do the same while I stack cheap sats to recover my losses before they wake up and pump the price. It wouldn't be fair if they skipped that stage. Also, supporting shipcoins makes the Trezor device cheaper, which I can't complain about either.
You sound like someone who hits their kids because you got hit as a kid.
LIFE ISNT FAIR- GROW UP
If you don't see the difference between violating the NAP and expressing joy at the workings of an inefficient free market, I can only pity you.
Are there any plans for a bitcoin only wallet?
Are you aware they have bitcoin-only firmware? Or do you mean hardware which really can only support bitcoin? Not sure if this is possible
I was not. My mistake
no worries :)
I think they're talking about trezor suite
If you install the bitcoin-only firmware, Trezor Suite also only shows bitcoin. Or what do you mean?
Never used Trezor suite, just trying to troubleshoot what they might mean
Correct, we do have a bitcoin-only FW you can use today.
Will you re-consider the removal of the Trezor Password manager and keep at least the basic functionality? Lack of mobile support and browser integration is fine, as long as we keep the ability to store highly sensitive secrets (encryption keys, recovery keys, etc.) There is no alternative with such a great security model as yours. Especially in the light of SW password managers getting pwned I think this would be appreciated by your die hard fans.
I hear you. The new technical changes to Google Chrome has introduced technical challenges that would require a large reallocation of resources to developing the Password Manager, holding back the development of other products with higher priority. That being said, we are well aware of the use case (and usefullness of the solution being it's die hard fans ourselves!) and hoping to see it back on the roadmap once the resources allow for it.
What's your guestimate for how many distinct people have some bitcoin and what percentage of that does self-custody?
And what's the biggest obstacle for growing those numbers? What needs to change for these numbers to double and 10x?
According to a survey conducted by the Cambridge Center for Alternative Finance in 2020, it's estimated that around 101 million people around the world currently own Bitcoin or some other form of cryptocurrency. It's worth noting that this estimate is based on self-reported data, and the actual number of Bitcoin owners may be higher or lower than this estimate. (Credit: ChatGPT)
My answers:
Out of those 100+ bitcoin/crypto users, I estimate some 10 million to be in self-custody (10%). So a lot work to be done! 📈
As for the obstacles to wider adoption, I believe we need to make self-custody even more user-friendly and stress free. Bitcoin and crypto has been around for a relatively short time compared to the "paper with pictures on it" and its nature might confuse the newcomers entering the market. We are working on a lot of new products and educational initiatives to build confidence and reassurance in the newbies.
Thank you. Great answer
Shamir backup seems to be missing from the larger crypto lexicon. Do you have strategies to help make this backup more popular?
Yes, we aim to popularize Shamir Backup more in the future through various types of educational content such as our recent tutorial video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W54g3T4WyIg
Do you spend the same time and energy on each of the many shitcoins you support as you do on Bitcoin? If not, is that fair on the people trusting your product to protect their shitcoins? If yes, is that fair to bitcoiners?
We spend much more time on Bitcoin than on all other coins combined. We were the first HW wallet to implement Bitcoin multisig, we were among the first HW wallets to implement Bitcoin Taproot, we were the first wallet to implement Bitcoin Coinjoin, the list goes on, we are the first hardware wallet thinking about integrating Lightning Network. We wouldn't be able to bring so many innovations on the table if what you are suggesting was true.
And still you are spending a lot of resources for alt coins aka "shitcoins" - this is up to point fraudulent and dishonest.
And no amount of marketing budget will fix this.
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On the product level (as in feature richness), bitcoin is where we started, is close to our hearts, and such has been getting priority treatment. On the security level, we ensure the security of all the users via the open-source security model embedded in our tech.
This was one of the best AMAs on SN. Bullets flew but Trevor stood tall! Bravo and thank you for all your work to bring bitcoin to the masses!
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Best hardware wallet in my experience, thanks for keep going .
<3
Thanks.
Can you beat the allegations?
So someone posted this guy a while ago: https://typefully.com/BitcoinCowries/Sf9U7vm
Trezor academy in Ghana. From what I understand, trezor comes by default filled with shitcoin software. It has to be purged manually with the Bitcoin only firmware. I know Trezor knows about Bitcoin Ekasi, but for everyone else:
"Everyone responsible for the confusion between Bitcoin and crypto should read this." https://stacker.news/items/104126
So what's the question? What the hell are you doing in Ghana? I've seen over and over again, scammer after scammer who introduces people to Bitcoin first because Bitcoin is the noncorperate issued social construct that fills people with hope and as soon as that has been introduced the scammers know the details they left out leave room for their coin, their "better than Bitcoin" grift. Is this what you are doing?
Trezor is never shipped with a preloaded firmware. Users have a choice to choose either universal or bitcoin-only firmware during the onboarding.
What are we doing in Ghana? The answer is supporting local bitcoin meetups and educating people about bitcoin and self-custody (the curriculum for the Trezor Academy is stricly bitcoin-only).
What kind of beer is in majority at company parties?
We usually have Pilsner Urquell and Birell as a non-alcoholic variant :-). And we actually have a Trezor Beer Fund where satisfied users can send us tips! https://trezor.io/support/a/trezor-beer-fund
Hehe. Nice:)
This is a random question but I've bought a few of your trezor one units over the years and a recent one had a "CE" sticker on it, which I had not seen it before. Made me suspicious. I suspect this is OK to use, right? (Natalie Portman face) right????
Yes, safe to use. CE marking is mandatory in the EU, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CE_marking for more info
thank you!
You do a lot of “shit-coin“ support.
This is a problem - you lose a lot o credibility.
Why?
See my answer above: https://stacker.news/items/174530
BitBox2 is far better.
When are you going to deliver the shielded Zcash integration? Still on track for July?
https://web.archive.org/web/20230224084828/https://grants.zfnd.org/proposals/1792958360-trezor-support-for-zcash-shielded-transactions
https://twitter.com/jswihart/status/1649053066040344585
Trezor + chainanalisis No questions.
I've been a customer since 2018. Are there any new products in the pipeline you can share with us? Or any new products or features you have in alpha or beta you can share with us.
New mobile app (beta, read only) is launching soon. Like in the coming weeks soon..! Then, we are super excited about new HW products to drop later this year and also other planned for next year.
Does anyone on your team have as big of an ego as NVK?
What is the main upside of using a hardware wallet like a tezor apposed to just manually saving seeds offline?