TOOLS Bithues Editorial

Wallet Safety Checklist

Run this before you sign anything

Use this checklist before connecting your wallet to any site, signing any transaction, or moving funds anywhere. Five minutes of friction is cheaper than losing everything.

☐ The link came from me, not them

I navigated to the site myself (typed the URL or used my bookmark). No one sent me a link in Discord, Telegram, email, or DM. If the link came from anyone else, stop.

☐ The URL is exact

I checked the URL character by character. There are no subtle swaps (like uniswapp.com instead of uniswap.org), no extra dashes, no wrong TLD.

☐ The site is the official site

For DeFi protocols, this is the bookmark I saved when I first verified the protocol — not a search result.

☐ I know what the transaction does

I've read the wallet confirmation. I know what method is being called (transfer, approve, swap, etc.) and what amount. I haven't just clicked through.

☐ The approval is limited, not unlimited

If I'm approving a token spend, the amount is the specific amount I'll actually use. If it's unlimited, I've thought about why and accepted the trade.

☐ I checked the contract address

The contract being interacted with matches the official contract address from the protocol's documentation. I've verified this on a block explorer.

☐ The transaction is on the right network

I'm not signing something for Ethereum mainnet when I meant Base, or vice versa. (Cross-chain exploits often rely on network confusion.)

☐ I have what I need to recover

If my device dies, gets stolen, or breaks, I can still access my funds. My seed phrase backup exists, is current, and is stored safely.

☐ The amount is what I expect

The amount in the wallet confirmation matches what I intended to send. Not "$10" when the site said "$100." Not "all USDC" when I meant "10 USDC."

☐ I'm not in a hurry

If I feel pressured to act fast, I've stopped and waited. No legitimate crypto opportunity requires acting in the next 5 minutes.

What to do if any check fails

If you answered "no" or "I don't know" to any of the above, stop the transaction. Either:

The cost of stopping is zero. The cost of signing the wrong transaction can be everything.

Related

Part of these paths