Ledger Nano X with Éric Larchêveque
Joining us live from Las Vegas, moments before a David Copperfield live show, Éric Larchêveque took some time to talk to Matthew Aaron in this episode of CRYPTO 101. The two spoke about the Ledger’s new hardware wallet, the Ledger Nano X, as well as overall security best practices in the space.
Who is Éric Larchêveque?
Éric is a self professed life-long entrepreneur; Ledger is his 8th company. In 2013 he was looking for something new to do after selling his most recent business. He knew Bitcoin was an integral part of the future but was not sure how he could bring something new to the space. He soon decided to open a Bitcoin Centre in Paris “The House of Bitcoin” — a place where people could buy, sell and learn about Bitcoin. For one year he taught people about blockchain technology and the intricacies of Bitcoin in the heart of paris.
During this time he met with many startups — one of which was BTChip who were involved in the Smart Card industry. The man behind BTChip at the time was Niccolas Bacca, now the CTO of Ledger. BTChip had a product called the HW1 which was a rudimentary hardware wallet which was quite difficult to use. Another startup Larchêveque met were a postal service crypto distributor who were in need os a secure way of physically delivering crypto safely. Larchêveque saw the potential for the merging of his own initiative with these two startups and thus Ledger was born.
What is a Hardware Wallet?
This topic has been covered plenty of times. However, one of the criticisms of Ledger’s products is that they are overpriced USB sticks. Addressing this criticism helps answer the question of what a hardware wallet is.
“The hardware wallet, even though it looks like a USB stick, is not a USB drive. It is a secure computer which has a secure element. Basically it provides isolation. It makes sure that even though the hardware wallet is connected to computer or the smartphone, through USB cable or Bluetooth or whatever, it will never expose the private keys to the host computer. If you want to make a signature, the signature will be done inside the secure element and the computer will get only the signed transaction.”
Ledger — The Company
Ledger is now a household name, at least in those households who hold crypto. To go from a small startup in a nascent technology like blockchain into something as large and successful as Ledger is a remarkable journey. But it is a journey that is riddled with obstacles.
“What happened with Ledger [exceeded] all of my expectations… When you scale very quickly, there are a lot of costs... We had up to 40–45 weeks of lead time.”
It’s no secret that the 2017 bull run lead to a significant slow-down in ledger availability. Ledger plan on being prepared for another bull run. Much of their production has moved back from China to France.
The Evolution of Ledger Products
The Ledger Nano was simply a smart card that could connect to a computer via a USB connector. It had no screen interface on the unit itself. The user had to know and use their own seed phrase to sign transactions.
The Ledger Nano S was an evolution of the Ledger Nano where the ‘S’ quite literally stands for ‘screen’. This allowed better usability.
The Ledger Nano Blue was an adaption on the Nano S that utilised bluetooth technology to do away with the USB connectivity. However, due to difficulties with the Bluetooth connection, the product was released as a larger screen.
The Ledger Nano X
The newest addition to the product lineup and latest evolution of Ledger’s wallet technology is now the Ledger Nano X. With the Nano X bluetooth connectivity is brought to the hardware wallet space.
“[The X basically] stands for ‘extended’. We saw [it] not as a replacement of the Nano S but as something based on the Nano S but with more features. It is a hardware wallet with bluetooth connection, more space for apps and a bigger screen.”
Security Concerns
Some of our listeners had concerns about the security of bluetooth. Most specifically, people can see bluetooth devices nearby them whether or not they can connect to the network or not. This was not disputed by Larchêveque but he remained adamant that the security of the bluetooth connected device is the same as the USB connected device. This is because the keys are still stored on a secure computer (the device itself). No transaction can be signed by anyone attempting to compromise a bluetooth connection.
One option for people worried about the advertising of a bluetooth device that is currently impossible to deactivate with current bluetooth devices is changing the name of the Ledger X’s public network name. If for example, you changed the name of your ledger to ‘headphones’ nobody will have any way of knowing that ‘headphones’ is actually the name of a crypto hard wallet — your Ledger Nano X.
Additionally, one of the issues will be that the physical Ledger Nano X has to be on your person when you are wanting to sign a transaction. However, this might be thought of as just as much a a security concern as a feature. It is a core security feature of Ledger products that you can only sign transactions on the physical device.
Best Practices
Larchêveque was asked about his advice on best practices for ledger devices. His first piece of advice was, “take your time.” The next was to be sure to select a pin code with a minimum of 6 digits. Also, keep your backup seed phrase safe, which almost always means to keep it outside of your home.
There is NO WAY to restore your funds if you have lost or incorrectly copied down the 24 word backup phrase. However, there are only 2048 words that are used to create the seed phrase, so if you only have lost one of the 24 words, then you could technically go through all 2025 other words for the missing word until you have found the correct combination.
Also, if you are using your device regularly, update the firmware regularly.
Finally
This was a clear, insightful conversation around Ledger. Hardware wallets and overall crypto security with one of the most trusted big names in the space. Be sure to check out the podcast. If you’re in the market for a ledger Nano X, please use our referral link.
