Edited on powerpoint by @rapharchick

Hello to all and steem greeting to you reading this post. Special thanks to our Lecturer for this week Professor @awesononso for yet another wonderful lecture like this. We are going to be looking at a number of concepts relating still to the world of crypto trading but before we dive into our homework task responses let us lay a brief background to what we are going to be discussing here.

Have you ever heard about cryptography? By cryptography, we mean transmitting or sending a message or any information in a way that can only make sense to the recipient of that message. In other words, it can only be decrypted by the recipient of the message. This entails security. Even in dealing with Cryptocurrencies, we must ensure that we secure our coins and assets in a way that we tend to be the only ones who have a degree of influence over it. We use keys to secure funds in our wallets and these keys could either be Private or public keys. With this understood, let us answer the following questions

1.) Explain private and public Keys in relation to custodial and non-custodial wallets.

When we talk about a custodial wallet, we simply mean a wallet that keeps a customer’s private keys and also provides security for the customer's assets. In other words, the customer has almost No power over his assets or funds because the wallet and the funds are controlled by the centralized authorities. A very common example is our centralized banks who can take our funds and use them for other purposes without our concern. They could hand it to some other person as a loan or a draft and all this happens without your concern. You only believe that your funds are under the control of the centralized bank. We also have our non-custodial wallets. What are they? This is a decentralized type of wallet that gives the customers the right of owning his/her private keys. This implies the key owner has full control and responsibility for his funds. It is decentralized that means there isn’t any third party in it. The Private key owner controls the wallet.
We have been hearing about a private and Public key All through. What is therefore is A Private Key and a Public Key?

a. PRIVATE KEY:

A private key is a form of cryptography that could appear as strings, letters, or numbers that allow you to manage and secure your crypto funds. It can be used for both encryption and decryption. By decryption, we simply mean the key owner is able to unlock the coins in the wallet and so whatever he or wants to do with it. Having the private key of a wallet shows and proves ownership over that wallet and also the ability of you being able to sign transactions in the wallet and also unlock or use or even carry out other transactions with your coins using the key.

b. PUBLIC KEY:

A private key is superior to the public key. It is also a form of cryptography in the form of letters and stings and numbers that can only be used to for encryption. As the Name entails (“PUBLIC KEY”), it means it is open to the public and can be used by anyone to encrypt or to lock coins into a wallet. But this key cannot be used to decrypt or unlock these coins. To decrypt or to unlock, you make use of your private key as seen above. The Public Key is generated from the private key and it is used to authenticate a given digital signature. A public key helps to better prove ownership of the private key. Since the public key is a derivative of the private key, a public key is also used to ensure that a digital signature (which is often signed using a private key) came from that private key.

2.) What do you think about the Proof of Keys Day? What precautions would you take when participating?

“NOT YOUR KEYS… NOT YOUR BITCOIN” is the common slogan that characterizes this great event in the crypto world. The proof your keys day is a very important day and event in the life of everyone into Cryptocurrencies. This is an annual event that was launched by a US-based Cryptocurrency investor Trace Mayer. Mayer’s vision was to set aside a day (Every 3rd of January) whose aim was to remind every cryptocurrency investor that lack of control over your keys means you actually do not own the coins. Hence the phrase “Not your keys, not your Bitcoin”. The Proof of Keys Day was actually Launched on the 3rd of January 2019. This day was Bitcoin’s 10th-anniversary celebration. Since many people leave their cryptocurrency assets on exchanges, Mayer created this concept of the Proof your keys day as an annual celebration that will create awareness to investors to reclaim their coins and assets from exchanges so as to have confidence once again and have their Monetary autonomy. In other words, this is a memorable day yearly that encourages cryptocurrency owners to transfer their assets into their own personal wallets.
Talking about the precautions,
• A trader must be sure to ensure that whatever location or wallet he or she is retrieving her funds from the exchange to is a secured decentralized location where he or she has control and autonomy over the private keys so that moving funds in celebration for the proof of Keys Day doesn’t result to loss of funds or other complications.
• Also do not use a wallet whose keys you think have been compromised. This explains why your private keys must be stored in a location that is safe from hackers, viruses. Because on days like this, hackers will take advantage of investors who cannot better secure their wallet's private key to compromise or gain access to their keys and jail out funds. Make sure your wallets’ key is not compromised.
• You as a trader must also ensure that you have your private keys secured. Because even if you have your funds withdrawn from the exchange to your private wallet, carelessness with your private wallet keys can still lead you to loss of funds.
• Also make sure you are the prior owner of the wallet address you are retrieving your funds into.
• Finally, if you are moving funds from your exchange to your private wallet address on the proof of keys day, then You must check to ensure that you are using the correct blockchain address. Recall that bitcoin has a different address structure and formatting compared to other altcoins with different address formatting. So, you must be careful to send the right asset to the right address. I remember once doing a transaction that demanded a BTC address and I was told that by the wallet that “Entering an address which is not a BTC address will result to loss of funds”. This made me to be more careful so every investor should be careful and make sure the funds are retrieved to the right wallet addresses.

3.) Do you prefer Centralized exchanges or Decentralized wallets for storing your cryptocurrencies? Why?

No. I prefer decentralized wallets for storing my cryptocurrencies over Centralized Exchanges. Reasoned being that;
• Centralized wallets give me more control, autonomy, and authority over my funds.
• I have peace of mind as I that there is no possibility of a central authority using of working out their own things with my finances.
• With a decentralized wallet, I have a greater assurance of safety from hackers and thieves if I employ the best strategies of securing my private key. With Centralized exchanges and users billions in their keeping, there are always looked upon by hackers of goldmines
• Your Privacy is kept to you and you alone with decentralized wallets. There isn’t any demand by your wallet to fill out KYC forms which carry a lot of customers’ private information. KYC stands for “Know Your Customers”.
With all these, I prefer using a decentralized wallet over a centralized exchange.

4.) Let us assume it is Proof of Keys Day:

a.) Transfer at least 20 Steem from your Binance wallet to your Steemit wallet.

To transfer steem from Binance to my steem wallet, we follow the steps below guided by the attached screenshots

STEP 1: I open binance om my Pc and then after logging in I am brought to my dashboard where I click on “Wallet” as seen below

Source

STEP 2: As a drop-down pops up, I select deposit and withdrawal as seen below

Source

STEP 3: Another dashboard opens where I see my steem balance and all other balances. I click on withdraw

Source

STEP 4:A pop-up for authentification shows up. I took off some time to secure my account with google authenticator

Source

STEP 5: A menu pops up where I fill in details about the transaction and then I take withdraw

Source

Source

Source

STEP 6: After I click continue, I am demanded to input the authentication code from my google authentication app and also a confirmation code sent via email

Source

STEP 7: I take submit then wait for my approval message

Source

STEP 8: After processing is complete, the next thing I get is a confirmation message

Source

Finally, my 50 steem transferred from Binance into my decentralized steem wallet is received

Source

b.) Transfer at least 50 TRX from your Binance wallet to your TronLink wallet.

(Provide Screenshots and make sure you have your Keys).

To transfer trx from our Binance wallet into our decentralized wallet, we follow the following steps

1. Open binance and log in

Source

1. Go to wallets and click open the drop-down menu

Source

1. Select fiat and crypto(deposit and withdrawal)

Source

1. After the dashboard opens you click the withdraw section which is on the same line carrying your trx Balance.

Source

1. Next you are demanded to fill in your transaction details. (Coin, address, network, amount, etc…)
   Source
   
   Source

2. Click the “Withdraw button”

3. You wait for your approval messages and then you also wait for the transaction status to move from waiting for approval to complete
   
   Source

Source

1. You receive you confirmation mail telling you the transaction was a success.
   With this, we have our Tron withdrawn from our Binance exchange to our decentralized Tron wallet.

Source

5.) In one statement, what is the major significance of the transfers in question 4.

Transfers on a day like Proof of Keys Day signify a reminder and sensitization to people on the purpose of a decentralized blockchain system and the confidence, security, and autonomy they have moving funds from an exchange account to a decentralized wallet.

CONCLUSION

We have seen so far, a number of things pertaining to the proof of key crypto holiday, custodial and non-custodial wallets, public and private keys as well as Centralized exchanges and decentralized wallets. I want to conclude by reminding us that lost keys cannot be recovered so do well to secure your private key. “Not your keys, not your Bitcoin”

Special thanks to professor @awesononso for the wonderful lectures. It has been amazing going through and hoping to see you on the next.

NB: All screenshotted images are screenshots taken by me from my PC

@awesononso