Bitcoin passing $11k signals a new bull market, with incredibly exciting times ahead for Bitcoiners as we prepare to welcome a new flood of users into the ecosystem. But we must ask ourselves – how will new Bitcoiners store their coins? Will they use Coinbase, who already holds almost 1 million Bitcoin? Or will they embrace sovereignty, privacy, and ownership by self-custodying their own Bitcoin?
Foundation Devices believes that today’s hardware wallets make the wrong security and design tradeoffs. They’ve worked for us early Bitcoiners so far because we are willing to deal with difficult interfaces, metal seed backups, safety deposit boxes, Shamir’s Secret Sharing, and so much more. But they won’t work for the new wave of incoming Bitcoiners as we reach mass-adoption by the end of this decade.
Bitcoin needs a hardware foundation that is beautifully designed, easy to use, and open source. Most of today’s hardware, including Ledger wallets, are closed source. As Bitcoin’s market cap grows to the trillions, so do the incentives for attackers to compromise closed-source hardware. We must rebuild today’s hardware stack to be open source, auditable, and verifiable – from the chips to the circuit boards to the firmware and beyond.
Foundation is taking our first step on this journey by introducing an elegant, secure, and open source hardware wallet named Passport. We are thrilled to officially announce Passport today, and are accepting reservations for our first edition batch of 1000 units.
So what makes Passport special? Passport is designed to be elegant; something every Bitcoiner would be proud to carry. We use high quality materials like soft-touch plastic and copper-plated zinc alloy. At 4 inches long x 1.5 inches wide x 0.8 inches thin, Passport is comfortable to hold and use.
Passport’s interface is intuitive and familiar, with a simple navigation pad and physical alphanumeric keypad. There’s no need to learn how to navigate the menus and enter PIN numbers and passphrases – you already know how to use Passport.
To sign transactions, simply insert a microSD card or scan a QR code. Wallets like Bluewallet already support multi-QR transmission, and Passport is compatible with any software wallet that supports PSBTs over microSD or QR.
Passport is open source and uses the same high-level security architecture and firmware base as Coldcard, with a Microchip secure element and STM processor. The circuit board designs and firmware will be published on Github in the coming weeks, with hardware licensed under CERN’s Open Hardware License V2 and firmware under GPL3. No unknown code will run on the device.
Completely airgapped, Passport is powered by two AAA batteries and includes no USB port, Bluetooth, or wireless communications of any kind. Passport has numerous security features, such as security lights and an avalanche noise source for entropy. And Passport uses more trustable components, like a screen with circuitry etched directly into glass, which allows for easy inspection at production.
Foundation Devices, headquartered in Boston, is focused on building open hardware for Bitcoin and the sovereign Internet. We will proudly assemble Passport in the USA.
We cannot wait to tell you more about Passport in the coming weeks! Passport will launch for preorders in August and will ship by late December. We have already received over 500 email reservations for our first edition batch.
Learn more about Passport and reserve yours below!
And feel free to check out the FAQs and contact us at [email protected] with any questions.