What are Private and Public Keys?

You might be surprised but crypto wallets don’t actually hold your funds. Cryptocurrency is stored directly on the blockchain. While the main purpose of a crypto wallet is to be a secure vault for your private keys. What do these keys unlock and why are they so important?

Private key

A private key is a string of numbers and characters and is used to give access to your crypto funds. In simple terms, it's a digital signature that proves that you’re the holder of the assets and are able to make transactions.

Keeping your private keys requires great caution. If you use more than one blockchain, you will need to ensure the safety of a private key for each network — and difficulties multiply. Also, you should remember that if you lose your private key, in most cases, you no longer will have access to your funds. It is important:

— Not to share your private key;
— Keep it offline: do not store your key on the Internet and devices connected to the Web.

Blockchain technology gives you a choice: take the responsibility for managing keys in your own hands or entrust it to a secure crypto wallet. NC Wallet is ready to become a safeguard for your private keys. It will save you a lot of headache with controlling and storing your “secret” info.

In this case you don’t directly interact with private keys, so this eliminates the risk that you accidentally lose or share them with someone. The reliable NC Wallet helps you to stay calm, forget about managing the number of keys, and restore access to your funds in emergency cases.

Public key

At first sight, a public key may look like a shorter version of a private key. But there is a crucial difference between them. There is no need to keep your public key secret, as it is used to receive crypto payments. It means that you can freely share it to get paid.

A public key in the blockchain is a kind of identifier of a private key. The keys are mathematically connected with a function that is called “a hash”. Due to such a connection, it’s possible to define a public key from a private key, but at the same time, no one can take a public key and get the associated private one. A public key helps to identify that assets should be sent to you without revealing your secret private key. So, don’t be afraid, sharing your public key is absolutely safe, as there is no way to guess the private key knowing the public one.

Now you know the difference between private and public keys and how to protect your cryptocurrency.