People have terrible OPSEC

I frequented this sub (under an old account I think) during the good old UASF/Bcash/blocksize war saga and a little before, from around late 2016 on. From Jihan’s infamous “f*** your mother if you want f***” legendary Tweet to Ver’s epic meltdown on podcast, some really fun times. Bitcoin to $1,000 then the subsequent run up during UASF (around $5-9K iirc?) was so much fun. So exhilarating, the range of emotions felt during the run and whatnot, nothing nowadays compares. But I digress.

One thing I remember from this forum back then was people at least tried to practice good OPSEC hygiene.

Nowadays, however, I see so many posts with public declarations of how much bitcoin people have or have managed to hit with their stack. While it’s a commendable achievement that I’m sure people want to share and celebrate with fellow degens on Reddit, for the love of God, Allah, Yahweh, Buddha, shared common ancestor monkey or whoever it is you want to worship and/or believe in, please, protect yourselves at all times!! Rule number 1!!

Do people nowadays really not understand how terrible OPSEC publicly declaring their stack really is?

Do people understand what they are exposing themselves to with public declarations?

Are the 500 or so upvotes worth it? The “great job!” replies might invoke good vibes and a temporary adrenaline rush but is it worth risking the security and safety of yourselves and your families over it?

I might get hate for saying that and I’m sure I’ll be downvoted but I don’t care, I care more about people putting their safety and wellbeing at the forefront. We need to do a better job of raising awareness about that.

Come on people, please think about it…

EDIT, UPDATE:

Wow. I didn’t realise the term “OPSEC” would trigger so many people into a meltdown of epic proportions. But that’s quite a useful indicator in and of itself.

OPSEC is a term very frequently used by popular and well-established publications, service providers and even podcasts to discuss bitcoin security.

Just because one may not like that term, or the term triggers them because “lmao it’s bitcoin not military”, that doesn’t invalidate its historical use in the context of bitcoin security.

1. ⁠https://blog.casa.io/7-ways-to-level-up-your-bitcoin-opsec/
2. ⁠https://www.whatbitcoindid.com/opsec
3. ⁠https://bitcoinmagazine.com/culture/james-bond-learning-bitcoin-opsec-tips
4. ⁠https://www.coindesk.com/tag/opsec/
5. ⁠https://education.compassmining.io/education/opsecmanual/

Part of me regrets writing this, because going by some of the replies wow this sub really has declined.

But then another part of me doesn’t because there are some really great replies with meaningful context on how Reddit can be a dangerous attack vector.

Idk. Make of it what you will.

Some people will inevitably learn the hard way. That’s just how it always has been and always will be.