How we think about advice
One principle runs through everything here: the best setup is the simplest one that adequately covers your threat model — not the most impressive, and not the one that sells the most gear. Most people are safest on the lower rungs of the ladder and should stay there until a real reason moves them up. We’ll tell you when not to add complexity as often as when to.
We’re confidently pro-self-custody. Holding your own keys is a skill worth learning, and the risks are manageable once you can name them. But this is your money and your responsibility — nothing here is financial or legal advice, and you should never act on a step you don’t understand. When something is safety-critical, we say so loudly.
Who’s behind it
BitcoinKeys.guide is a RadVladdy project — part of a small family of independent, pseudonymous Bitcoin sites. Pseudonymity here is a feature, not evasion: writing about key security shouldn’t require the author to paint a target on their own back, and the advice stands on whether it’s correct, not on a name.
Where the material comes from
The guidance is distilled from the strongest practitioner sources in the field — Jameson Lopp’s two decades of security work, Blockchain Commons’ Smart Custody framework, and the published operational guidance from Unchained, Casa, Nunchuk, and others — then re-checked and written in plain English. Where those sources disagree, we say so rather than pretending there’s one answer.
Still being built This is an early, growing version. The single-sig rung and the wallet comparison are live; the rest of the ladder, the privacy and inheritance sections, and a guided “which setup do I need?” tool are on the way. Start here if you’re new.