Migrating to Full Self-Custody with My Keystone Wallet

Up until now, I've been using KuCoin's custodial wallet to hold some of my coins. The features like lending were pretty good and I took advantage of them. With the recent shift to require KYC, however, I grew a bit concerned for privacy and security concerns. After all, not my keys, not my crypto. (And the recent layoffs of 30% of staff reinforces my point.)

Self custody of one's own assets is crucial. It gives you full control over your wealth and you get to choose when to spend it in whatever amount you like. This is unlike the withdrawal limits you are forced to experience with your traditional bank account or custodial wallets. Of course, with that amount of control also comes with a lot of responsibility. You need to keep your private keys and passcodes in a safe and secure place. You also need to be aware of the differences between hot wallets and cold wallets.

Hot wallets are always online and can be susceptible to hacks like what happened with Atomic Wallet. While cold wallets are more secure, they are also not immune as demonstrated by the Ledger Recover controversy (which I covered here and here). If your cold wallet is connected to your PC, there is a very small, but possible chance that your private keys can be extracted by a nefarious 3rd party.

I have a Nano S which I still use, but I thought it would be a good idea not to put most of my coins there. As a result, I did some research and decided to go with the Keystone Essential (it also helped that Keystone offered a generous discount code for Ledger owners to knock the price from $120 to $85). Unlike the Ledger wallet, the Keystone wallet is air gapped, i.e. it is never connected to another hardware. Firmware updates, which are open-source, are done by placing the update in a microSD and placing the card in the wallet.

After using it for a few months, I can say the overall experience is mostly pleasant albeit a bit cumbersome depending on your use case scenario. If you're someone who mostly stores and forgets, it will be simple. Just select the coin you want to receive and use your computer or phone's camera to scan the QR code. If you want to stake or do some liquidity farming, it can get tedious as it involves scanning multiple QR codes and entering your wallet password to sign and confirm.

Either way, all of my coins are now on a self-custody wallet. No KuCoin. No Coinbase. No Binance. Nada.

This article is co-published on Odysee, Publish0x, and Steemit.