How to secure your crypto investment - step by step

                         In recent times, cryptocurrencies have not only lured in many investor through their extreme growth but bad actors too. So it has become extremely important for us to be vigilant at all times, or we could lose all of our investment in a blink of an eye. Moreover, crypto investments are not anything else you may be familiar with, unlike banks and traditional stock exchanges, there is virtually no fail safes in place if you make a mistake or don't understand what you are doing. There is no hotline you can call if you get stuck, no headquarters you could reach out to if you lose your funds. This all means at any time you could lose all your investments from hackers or user error with no recourse at all.

                         Cryptocurrency is cutting-edge technology, it's a modern-day wild-wild west. So it requires some time and energy to wrap your head around. Fortunately for you, I have done a lot of the legwork to compile this step by step guide to ensure that you receive the knowledge and understanding you need to be successful with your cryptocurrency investments. So before we move on any further I would like to tell you the golden rule of investment.

We as human have the tendency to overreach, so be careful.

                         It may come as a surprise to you, beacause crypto stuff are preety high tech, but believe me the first this you should consider doing is buy yourself some paper notebooks.Buy atleast 2 of these.

                         Use your paper notebooks to store all of your passwords, login credentials and any other sensitive information regarding your crypto assets.I know it's sound somewhat old fashion but you should never store your passwords online with your password manager, your phone or any device connected to the internet, not even your browser as they are also vulnerable to attacks.

                         So consider writing down your details onto these 2 notebooks and store them at different locations to be safe, so that in the event one of your notebooks get destroyed/lost due to some mishappening, you have the other one as a backup.

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                         In crypto you are dealing with real money so, security is utmost.Passwords related to crypto needs to be very strong. Hackers around the world are constantly trying to breach your accounts using software tailored for these purpose using powerful computers. These programs or softwares can iterate through a database of billions of common passwords, phrases or combination of characters. So in order to combat this never use short and common phrases or word or lines in a dictionary instead, your passwords should be sufficiently long enough mix of random alphanumeric + special characters + capitalization and jot them down on your paper notebooks. Also never use the same password for more than a single account and the reason is obvious as you may have already guessed.

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                         Last but not the least when setting up your security questions and their answer, try to come up with fake answers to your questions, because something like What's your grandma's middle name?, your high school name ? could easily be found out from your social media accounts or other online accounts. Don't believe me ? Check this site out Pay and Get anyone's data. There are several sites like these online and hackers take full advantage of these sites.

                         Before you setup any crypto-realted account or email, make user your device is free from anysort of malware. For these you can use antivirus program to scan your devices for malware. There are many free versions of antivirus available but, I will suggest you to go for a paid one, don't be Penny Smart Dollar Stupid.

                         If you are very serious about security and to move one step further, you can use Keyscramblers, to prevent keyloggers from stealing you sensitive info.A very popular one is qfxsoftware's Keyscrambler, there are both free and paid versions of this program. The free is good enough for regular use. These keyscramblers encrypt everything you type in realtime.

                         One more way to prevent keylogging is using an onscreen keyboard when entering your credentials, many people doesn't this fact. I'm glad now you know this.

                         Now-a-days almost everybody use their cellphone to access the internet and login to online accounts. So your cellphone can disclose a lot of information about you and therefore play a major role in your security. Do protect your cell phone with a password, so that in case it's stolen there with be a barrier between a potential hacker and your investments. Apart from this, you may want to remove your phone number you are using for your crypto related investments from any public and social media sites. This is because your cell phone number could be used for Sim Theft, where a hacker can call your telecom provider and request for a new sim card and drain your crypto funds by gaining access to 2FA (2 Factor Authentication).

                         Setup a brand new email address specific to use exclusively for your crypto investment accounts signup. Remember never use / share this email anywhere else.

                         Using a 2FA will add an extra layer of security to your accounts. A 2FA activated account will require you to enter a code you see in your 2FA app changes every 60 second or so along with your login credentials. So an attacker will not be able to login to your account even if somehow they have your password and username, unless they have your phone at that moment of time. The two popular 2fa app are Google Auth and Authy. You can use any of the two mentioned.

                         More of the crypto account hacks are due to leak of users private keys. So, If you are willing to put a little more investment to safeguard your funds, you may want to use a hardware wallet. These are robust passively powered wallets which you can use to store, transact your funds without the keys ever leaving the wallet device. If you have a serious amount of funds in crypto then, I would highly suggest you to get yourself a hardware wallet. The popular ones in the market now are Ledger Nano and Trezor wallet.

                         A lot of people investing in crypto are young millennials and if something were to happen to you, there may be someone whom you want to benefit of your investments. However, the person you may want to benefit may be it your mom, your wife or your girlfriend, in the event of your death may have a hard time figuring out all by themselves. Using your paper notebooks, record a detail instruction for them to get access, transfer and cash in your funds if they ever need to do so.
                         You can go one step forward regarding this and create a will or trust that could be legally executed in the event of your death to carry out your last wishes.