4

Assumptions:

  1. I've memorized my electrum seed and will never forget it

  2. In the future, I'm robbed of everything but mind and body

  3. In the future, Electrum software is not easily accessible or I can only access thin clients

Question:

Is there another way to use my 12 word seed?

HTML port of Electrum hosted somewhere? iOS wallet that's electrum compatible? Etc.

Is there a reason it's local software and not just HTML? (other than someone dedicating the time)

Is there a reason 12 word seeds aren't universal across wallets that use 12 word seeds?

3 Answers 3

6

As Electrum is open-source software, we can probably safely assume it will never go away. That is, even if the devs were to take it off of github etc, there are likely thousands of copies of the source code distributed on the nets. But let's say all the electrum servers were taken down and for whatever reason you couldn't run a python interpretter (not very likely). Again because Electrum is open-source, the algorithm for transforming a seed into a private key and the derived private keys is known. So in theory, you could just do the math and generate your private keys manually from your seed. Practically, if you can get hold of a python interpretter, you can restore an Electrum database and dump all of your private keys without ever connecting to the internet. From there, sweep the balances into any wallet such as Bitcoin-QT.

4

jonald_fyookball on BitcoinTalk has written a short python script that will generate your addresses/private keys without Electrum:

# This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
# it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
# the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the License, or
# (at your option) any later version.
#
# This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
# but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
# MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
# GNU General Public License for more details.
#
#
#  - NOTE:  You will need to install the hashlib and ecdsa modules into Python!
#
#
#
import hashlib, ecdsa
from ecdsa.curves import SECP256k1
from ecdsa.ellipticcurve import Point
from ecdsa.util import string_to_number, number_to_string
from ecdsa.ecdsa import curve_secp256k1, generator_secp256k1
#
#
#
#
#
#

##--------------------------------------------------------------------------

numberofreceivingaddresses=6;
numberofchangeaddresses=6;
seed="constant forest adore false green weave stop guy fur freeze giggle clock";

##--------------------------------------------------------------------------
def sha256(x):
    return hashlib.sha256(x).digest()

def Hash(x):
    if type(x) is unicode: x=x.encode('utf-8')
    return sha256(sha256(x))

def pw_decode(s, password):
    if password is not None:
        secret = Hash(password)
        try:
            d = DecodeAES(secret, s).decode("utf8")
        except Exception:
            raise Exception('Invalid password')
        return d
    else:
        return s

def get_address(mpk,  for_change, n):
        pubkey =  get_pubkey(mpk,for_change, n)
        address = public_key_to_bc_address( pubkey.decode('hex') )
    print "Address " + str(n) + ": " + address;
    print "public key";
    print "     "+pubkey;
        return address


def get_pubkey(mpk, for_change, n):
        curve = SECP256k1
        z = get_sequence(mpk,for_change,n);
        master_public_key = ecdsa.VerifyingKey.from_string( mpk, curve = SECP256k1 )
        pubkey_point = master_public_key.pubkey.point + z*curve.generator
        public_key2 = ecdsa.VerifyingKey.from_public_point( pubkey_point, curve = SECP256k1 )
        return '04' + public_key2.to_string().encode('hex')

def get_sequence(mpk, for_change, n):
        return string_to_number( Hash( "%d:%d:"%(n,for_change) + mpk ) )

def get_private_key_from_stretched_exponent(mpk,for_change, n, secexp):
        order = generator_secp256k1.order()
        secexp = ( secexp + get_sequence(mpk,for_change, n) ) % order
        pk = number_to_string( secexp, generator_secp256k1.order() )
        compressed = False
        return SecretToASecret( pk, compressed )

def get_private_key(mpk,seed, sequence):
        for_change, n = sequence
        secexp = stretch_key(seed)
        pk = get_private_key_from_stretched_exponent(mpk,for_change, n, secexp)
        return pk;

def stretch_key(seed):
        oldseed = seed
        for i in range(100000):
            seed = hashlib.sha256(seed + oldseed).digest()
        return string_to_number( seed )

def public_key_to_bc_address(public_key):
    h160 = hash_160(public_key)
    return hash_160_to_bc_address(h160)

def SecretToASecret(secret, compressed=False, addrtype=0):
    vchIn = chr((addrtype+128)&255) + secret
    if compressed: vchIn += '\01'
    return EncodeBase58Check(vchIn)

def EncodeBase58Check(vchIn):
    hash = Hash(vchIn)
    return b58encode(vchIn + hash[0:4])

def b58encode(v):
    """ encode v, which is a string of bytes, to base58."""

    long_value = 0L
    for (i, c) in enumerate(v[::-1]):
        long_value += (256**i) * ord(c)
    result = ''
    while long_value >= __b58base:
        div, mod = divmod(long_value, __b58base)
        result = __b58chars[mod] + result
        long_value = div
    result = __b58chars[long_value] + result

    # Bitcoin does a little leading-zero-compression:
    # leading 0-bytes in the input become leading-1s
    nPad = 0
    for c in v:
        if c == '\0': nPad += 1
        else: break

    return (__b58chars[0]*nPad) + result

def hash_160(public_key):
    try:
        md = hashlib.new('ripemd160')
        md.update(sha256(public_key))
        return md.digest()
    except Exception:
        import ripemd
        md = ripemd.new(sha256(public_key))
        return md.digest()

def hash_160_to_bc_address(h160, addrtype = 0):
    vh160 = chr(addrtype) + h160
    h = Hash(vh160)
    addr = vh160 + h[0:4]
    return b58encode(addr)

__b58chars = '123456789ABCDEFGHJKLMNPQRSTUVWXYZabcdefghijkmnopqrstuvwxyz'
__b58base = len(__b58chars)

##-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

words = [ "like", "just", "love", "know", "never", "want", "time", "out", "there", "make", "look", "eye", "down", "only", "think", "heart", "back", "then", "into", "about", "more", "away", "still", "them", "take", "thing", "even", "through", "long", "always", "world", "too", "friend", "tell", "try", "hand", "thought", "over", "here", "other", "need", "smile", "again", "much", "cry", "been", "night", "ever", "little", "said", "end", "some", "those", "around", "mind", "people", "girl", "leave", "dream", "left", "turn", "myself", "give", "nothing", "really", "off", "before", "something", "find", "walk", "wish", "good", "once", "place", "ask", "stop", "keep", "watch", "seem", "everything", "wait", "got", "yet", "made", "remember", "start", "alone", "run", "hope", "maybe", "believe", "body", "hate", "after", "close", "talk", "stand", "own", "each", "hurt", "help", "home", "god", "soul", "new", "many", "two", "inside", "should", "true", "first", "fear", "mean", "better", "play", "another", "gone", "change", "use", "wonder", "someone", "hair", "cold", "open", "best", "any", "behind", "happen", "water", "dark", "laugh", "stay", "forever", "name", "work", "show", "sky", "break", "came", "deep", "door", "put", "black", "together", "upon", "happy", "such", "great", "white", "matter", "fill", "past", "please", "burn", "cause", "enough", "touch", "moment", "soon", "voice", "scream", "anything", "stare", "sound", "red", "everyone", "hide", "kiss", "truth", "death", "beautiful", "mine", "blood", "broken", "very", "pass", "next", "forget", "tree", "wrong", "air", "mother", "understand", "lip", "hit", "wall", "memory", "sleep", "free", "high", "realize", "school", "might", "skin", "sweet", "perfect", "blue", "kill", "breath", "dance", "against", "fly", "between", "grow", "strong", "under", "listen", "bring", "sometimes", "speak", "pull", "person", "become", "family", "begin", "ground", "real", "small", "father", "sure", "feet", "rest", "young", "finally", "land", "across", "today", "different", "guy", "line", "fire", "reason", "reach", "second", "slowly", "write", "eat", "smell", "mouth", "step", "learn", "three", "floor", "promise", "breathe", "darkness", "push", "earth", "guess", "save", "song", "above", "along", "both", "color", "house", "almost", "sorry", "anymore", "brother", "okay", "dear", "game", "fade", "already", "apart", "warm", "beauty", "heard", "notice", "question", "shine", "began", "piece", "whole", "shadow", "secret", "street", "within", "finger", "point", "morning", "whisper", "child", "moon", "green", "story", "glass", "kid", "silence", "since", "soft", "yourself", "empty", "shall", "angel", "answer", "baby", "bright", "dad", "path", "worry", "hour", "drop", "follow", "power", "war", "half", "flow", "heaven", "act", "chance", "fact", "least", "tired", "children", "near", "quite", "afraid", "rise", "sea", "taste", "window", "cover", "nice", "trust", "lot", "sad", "cool", "force", "peace", "return", "blind", "easy", "ready", "roll", "rose", "drive", "held", "music", "beneath", "hang", "mom", "paint", "emotion", "quiet", "clear", "cloud", "few", "pretty", "bird", "outside", "paper", "picture", "front", "rock", "simple", "anyone", "meant", "reality", "road", "sense", "waste", "bit", "leaf", "thank", "happiness", "meet", "men", "smoke", "truly", "decide", "self", "age", "book", "form", "alive", "carry", "escape", "damn", "instead", "able", "ice", "minute", "throw", "catch", "leg", "ring", "course", "goodbye", "lead", "poem", "sick", "corner", "desire", "known", "problem", "remind", "shoulder", "suppose", "toward", "wave", "drink", "jump", "woman", "pretend", "sister", "week", "human", "joy", "crack", "grey", "pray", "surprise", "dry", "knee", "less", "search", "bleed", "caught", "clean", "embrace", "future", "king", "son", "sorrow", "chest", "hug", "remain", "sat", "worth", "blow", "daddy", "final", "parent", "tight", "also", "create", "lonely", "safe", "cross", "dress", "evil", "silent", "bone", "fate", "perhaps", "anger", "class", "scar", "snow", "tiny", "tonight", "continue", "control", "dog", "edge", "mirror", "month", "suddenly", "comfort", "given", "loud", "quickly", "gaze", "plan", "rush", "stone", "town", "battle", "ignore", "spirit", "stood", "stupid", "yours", "brown", "build", "dust", "hey", "kept", "pay", "phone", "twist", "although", "ball", "beyond", "hidden", "nose", "taken", "fail", "float", "pure", "somehow", "wash", "wrap", "angry", "cheek", "creature", "forgotten", "heat", "rip", "single", "space", "special", "weak", "whatever", "yell", "anyway", "blame", "job", "choose", "country", "curse", "drift", "echo", "figure", "grew", "laughter", "neck", "suffer", "worse", "yeah", "disappear", "foot", "forward", "knife", "mess", "somewhere", "stomach", "storm", "beg", "idea", "lift", "offer", "breeze", "field", "five", "often", "simply", "stuck", "win", "allow", "confuse", "enjoy", "except", "flower", "seek", "strength", "calm", "grin", "gun", "heavy", "hill", "large", "ocean", "shoe", "sigh", "straight", "summer", "tongue", "accept", "crazy", "everyday", "exist", "grass", "mistake", "sent", "shut", "surround", "table", "ache", "brain", "destroy", "heal", "nature", "shout", "sign", "stain", "choice", "doubt", "glance", "glow", "mountain", "queen", "stranger", "throat", "tomorrow", "city", "either", "fish", "flame", "rather", "shape", "spin", "spread", "ash", "distance", "finish", "image", "imagine", "important", "nobody", "shatter", "warmth", "became", "feed", "flesh", "funny", "lust", "shirt", "trouble", "yellow", "attention", "bare", "bite", "money", "protect", "amaze", "appear", "born", "choke", "completely", "daughter", "fresh", "friendship", "gentle", "probably", "six", "deserve", "expect", "grab", "middle", "nightmare", "river", "thousand", "weight", "worst", "wound", "barely", "bottle", "cream", "regret", "relationship", "stick", "test", "crush", "endless", "fault", "itself", "rule", "spill", "art", "circle", "join", "kick", "mask", "master", "passion", "quick", "raise", "smooth", "unless", "wander", "actually", "broke", "chair", "deal", "favorite", "gift", "note", "number", "sweat", "box", "chill", "clothes", "lady", "mark", "park", "poor", "sadness", "tie", "animal", "belong", "brush", "consume", "dawn", "forest", "innocent", "pen", "pride", "stream", "thick", "clay", "complete", "count", "draw", "faith", "press", "silver", "struggle", "surface", "taught", "teach", "wet", "bless", "chase", "climb", "enter", "letter", "melt", "metal", "movie", "stretch", "swing", "vision", "wife", "beside", "crash", "forgot", "guide", "haunt", "joke", "knock", "plant", "pour", "prove", "reveal", "steal", "stuff", "trip", "wood", "wrist", "bother", "bottom", "crawl", "crowd", "fix", "forgive", "frown", "grace", "loose", "lucky", "party", "release", "surely", "survive", "teacher", "gently", "grip", "speed", "suicide", "travel", "treat", "vein", "written", "cage", "chain", "conversation", "date", "enemy", "however", "interest", "million", "page", "pink", "proud", "sway", "themselves", "winter", "church", "cruel", "cup", "demon", "experience", "freedom", "pair", "pop", "purpose", "respect", "shoot", "softly", "state", "strange", "bar", "birth", "curl", "dirt", "excuse", "lord", "lovely", "monster", "order", "pack", "pants", "pool", "scene", "seven", "shame", "slide", "ugly", "among", "blade", "blonde", "closet", "creek", "deny", "drug", "eternity", "gain", "grade", "handle", "key", "linger", "pale", "prepare", "swallow", "swim", "tremble", "wheel", "won", "cast", "cigarette", "claim", "college", "direction", "dirty", "gather", "ghost", "hundred", "loss", "lung", "orange", "present", "swear", "swirl", "twice", "wild", "bitter", "blanket", "doctor", "everywhere", "flash", "grown", "knowledge", "numb", "pressure", "radio", "repeat", "ruin", "spend", "unknown", "buy", "clock", "devil", "early", "false", "fantasy", "pound", "precious", "refuse", "sheet", "teeth", "welcome", "add", "ahead", "block", "bury", "caress", "content", "depth", "despite", "distant", "marry", "purple", "threw", "whenever", "bomb", "dull", "easily", "grasp", "hospital", "innocence", "normal", "receive", "reply", "rhyme", "shade", "someday", "sword", "toe", "visit", "asleep", "bought", "center", "consider", "flat", "hero", "history", "ink", "insane", "muscle", "mystery", "pocket", "reflection", "shove", "silently", "smart", "soldier", "spot", "stress", "train", "type", "view", "whether", "bus", "energy", "explain", "holy", "hunger", "inch", "magic", "mix", "noise", "nowhere", "prayer", "presence", "shock", "snap", "spider", "study", "thunder", "trail", "admit", "agree", "bag", "bang", "bound", "butterfly", "cute", "exactly", "explode", "familiar", "fold", "further", "pierce", "reflect", "scent", "selfish", "sharp", "sink", "spring", "stumble", "universe", "weep", "women", "wonderful", "action", "ancient", "attempt", "avoid", "birthday", "branch", "chocolate", "core", "depress", "drunk", "especially", "focus", "fruit", "honest", "match", "palm", "perfectly", "pillow", "pity", "poison", "roar", "shift", "slightly", "thump", "truck", "tune", "twenty", "unable", "wipe", "wrote", "coat", "constant", "dinner", "drove", "egg", "eternal", "flight", "flood", "frame", "freak", "gasp", "glad", "hollow", "motion", "peer", "plastic", "root", "screen", "season", "sting", "strike", "team", "unlike", "victim", "volume", "warn", "weird", "attack", "await", "awake", "built", "charm", "crave", "despair", "fought", "grant", "grief", "horse", "limit", "message", "ripple", "sanity", "scatter", "serve", "split", "string", "trick", "annoy", "blur", "boat", "brave", "clearly", "cling", "connect", "fist", "forth", "imagination", "iron", "jock", "judge", "lesson", "milk", "misery", "nail", "naked", "ourselves", "poet", "possible", "princess", "sail", "size", "snake", "society", "stroke", "torture", "toss", "trace", "wise", "bloom", "bullet", "cell", "check", "cost", "darling", "during", "footstep", "fragile", "hallway", "hardly", "horizon", "invisible", "journey", "midnight", "mud", "nod", "pause", "relax", "shiver", "sudden", "value", "youth", "abuse", "admire", "blink", "breast", "bruise", "constantly", "couple", "creep", "curve", "difference", "dumb", "emptiness", "gotta", "honor", "plain", "planet", "recall", "rub", "ship", "slam", "soar", "somebody", "tightly", "weather", "adore", "approach", "bond", "bread", "burst", "candle", "coffee", "cousin", "crime", "desert", "flutter", "frozen", "grand", "heel", "hello", "language", "level", "movement", "pleasure", "powerful", "random", "rhythm", "settle", "silly", "slap", "sort", "spoken", "steel", "threaten", "tumble", "upset", "aside", "awkward", "bee", "blank", "board", "button", "card", "carefully", "complain", "crap", "deeply", "discover", "drag", "dread", "effort", "entire", "fairy", "giant", "gotten", "greet", "illusion", "jeans", "leap", "liquid", "march", "mend", "nervous", "nine", "replace", "rope", "spine", "stole", "terror", "accident", "apple", "balance", "boom", "childhood", "collect", "demand", "depression", "eventually", "faint", "glare", "goal", "group", "honey", "kitchen", "laid", "limb", "machine", "mere", "mold", "murder", "nerve", "painful", "poetry", "prince", "rabbit", "shelter", "shore", "shower", "soothe", "stair", "steady", "sunlight", "tangle", "tease", "treasure", "uncle", "begun", "bliss", "canvas", "cheer", "claw", "clutch", "commit", "crimson", "crystal", "delight", "doll", "existence", "express", "fog", "football", "gay", "goose", "guard", "hatred", "illuminate", "mass", "math", "mourn", "rich", "rough", "skip", "stir", "student", "style", "support", "thorn", "tough", "yard", "yearn", "yesterday", "advice", "appreciate", "autumn", "bank", "beam", "bowl", "capture", "carve", "collapse", "confusion", "creation", "dove", "feather", "girlfriend", "glory", "government", "harsh", "hop", "inner", "loser", "moonlight", "neighbor", "neither", "peach", "pig", "praise", "screw", "shield", "shimmer", "sneak", "stab", "subject", "throughout", "thrown", "tower", "twirl", "wow", "army", "arrive", "bathroom", "bump", "cease", "cookie", "couch", "courage", "dim", "guilt", "howl", "hum", "husband", "insult", "led", "lunch", "mock", "mostly", "natural", "nearly", "needle", "nerd", "peaceful", "perfection", "pile", "price", "remove", "roam", "sanctuary", "serious", "shiny", "shook", "sob", "stolen", "tap", "vain", "void", "warrior", "wrinkle", "affection", "apologize", "blossom", "bounce", "bridge", "cheap", "crumble", "decision", "descend", "desperately", "dig", "dot", "flip", "frighten", "heartbeat", "huge", "lazy", "lick", "odd", "opinion", "process", "puzzle", "quietly", "retreat", "score", "sentence", "separate", "situation", "skill", "soak", "square", "stray", "taint", "task", "tide", "underneath", "veil", "whistle", "anywhere", "bedroom", "bid", "bloody", "burden", "careful", "compare", "concern", "curtain", "decay", "defeat", "describe", "double", "dreamer", "driver", "dwell", "evening", "flare", "flicker", "grandma", "guitar", "harm", "horrible", "hungry", "indeed", "lace", "melody", "monkey", "nation", "object", "obviously", "rainbow", "salt", "scratch", "shown", "shy", "stage", "stun", "third", "tickle", "useless", "weakness", "worship", "worthless", "afternoon", "beard", "boyfriend", "bubble", "busy", "certain", "chin", "concrete", "desk", "diamond", "doom", "drawn", "due", "felicity", "freeze", "frost", "garden", "glide", "harmony", "hopefully", "hunt", "jealous", "lightning", "mama", "mercy", "peel", "physical", "position", "pulse", "punch", "quit", "rant", "respond", "salty", "sane", "satisfy", "savior", "sheep", "slept", "social", "sport", "tuck", "utter", "valley", "wolf", "aim", "alas", "alter", "arrow", "awaken", "beaten", "belief", "brand", "ceiling", "cheese", "clue", "confidence", "connection", "daily", "disguise", "eager", "erase", "essence", "everytime", "expression", "fan", "flag", "flirt", "foul", "fur", "giggle", "glorious", "ignorance", "law", "lifeless", "measure", "mighty", "muse", "north", "opposite", "paradise", "patience", "patient", "pencil", "petal", "plate", "ponder", "possibly", "practice", "slice", "spell", "stock", "strife", "strip", "suffocate", "suit", "tender", "tool", "trade", "velvet", "verse", "waist", "witch", "aunt", "bench", "bold", "cap", "certainly", "click", "companion", "creator", "dart", "delicate", "determine", "dish", "dragon", "drama", "drum", "dude", "everybody", "feast", "forehead", "former", "fright", "fully", "gas", "hook", "hurl", "invite", "juice", "manage", "moral", "possess", "raw", "rebel", "royal", "scale", "scary", "several", "slight", "stubborn", "swell", "talent", "tea", "terrible", "thread", "torment", "trickle", "usually", "vast", "violence", "weave", "acid", "agony", "ashamed", "awe", "belly", "blend", "blush", "character", "cheat", "common", "company", "coward", "creak", "danger", "deadly", "defense", "define", "depend", "desperate", "destination", "dew", "duck", "dusty", "embarrass", "engine", "example", "explore", "foe", "freely", "frustrate", "generation", "glove", "guilty", "health", "hurry", "idiot", "impossible", "inhale", "jaw", "kingdom", "mention", "mist", "moan", "mumble", "mutter", "observe", "ode", "pathetic", "pattern", "pie", "prefer", "puff", "rape", "rare", "revenge", "rude", "scrape", "spiral", "squeeze", "strain", "sunset", "suspend", "sympathy", "thigh", "throne", "total", "unseen", "weapon", "weary" ] 

def mn_decode( wlist ):
    n=1626;
    out = ''
    for i in range(len(wlist)/3):
        word1, word2, word3 = wlist[3*i:3*i+3]
        w1 =  words.index(word1)
        w2 = (words.index(word2))%n
        w3 = (words.index(word3))%n
        x = w1 +n*((w2-w1)%n) +n*n*((w3-w2)%n)
        out += '%08x'%x
    return out

##--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

print "......ready to compute.....";
print " ";
seedlist=str.split(seed);

password = None; 
seed=mn_decode(seedlist);

oldseed=seed;
newseed=stretch_key(seed);
curve = SECP256k1
master_private_key = ecdsa.SigningKey.from_secret_exponent( newseed, curve = SECP256k1 );
master_public_key = master_private_key.get_verifying_key().to_string().encode('hex');
mpk=master_public_key.decode('hex');

print "MASTER PUBLIC KEY IS "
print "  ";
print master_public_key;


print "  ";
print "  ";

print "++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++";

print "RECEIVING ADDRESSES ";
print "  ";
print "  ";

for ra in range(0,numberofreceivingaddresses):
    addy=get_address(mpk,0,ra);
    pk=get_private_key(mpk,oldseed,(0,ra));
    print "private key";
    print "     "+pk;
    print "  ";


print "++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++";

print "CHANGE ADDRESSES";

print "  ";
print "  ";

for ca in range(0,numberofchangeaddresses):
    addy=get_address(mpk,1,ca);
    pk=get_private_key(mpk,oldseed,(1,ca));
    print "private key";
    print "     "+pk;
    print "  ";


print " ";
print " ";
print "++++++++++++++++++++++++++";
print " ";
print " ";
print "END OF PROGRAM.  - Jonald Fyookball 2014...";
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There is an HTML client called http://carbonwallet.com, but it is made by an individual I wouldn't trust putting my seed there unless I'm sure what the code does.

You can try the Android version that is available, or wait a bit more for the Electrum Kivy for Android (and iOS).

HTML clients are Javascript that runs in BROWSERS!... so local software is better and more secure.

Electrum uses its own 12 words seeds since it was created, with version 2.0 it will use its own 14 words passphrases for the BIP32 standard (so it will use a non-standard). So unless you see a "Electrum seeds/12 words passphrases" supported you'll have to either manually compare the results in other wallets or ask for Electrum's seeds support.

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