BitGo – multi-signature technology for regulated economy

https://www.bitgo.com

Whitepaper listed here.

BitGo provides multi-sig wallet for enterprises and consumer. Currently BitGo’s platform processes over $10 billion in transactions per month. BitGo does not store the asset or currency, instead it provides tools for enterprises to avoid keys management , policies to avoid single point of failure and assets are moved in and out of wallets securely.

P2SH multisig is the key usecases for using BitGo. Where 3 parties are involved with BitGo holds one of the private keys , user holds one and recovery service holds the 3rd key. We need signature of 2 out of 3 parties to make a transaction. BitGo also provides easy api’s for enterprises to implement HD Wallets.

What is a HD wallet:

A good read regarding HD Wallets the reasons for it is provided here at Coinsutra.com.

HD Wallets stand for Hierarchical Deterministic Wallets.A deterministic wallet is a system of deriving keys from a single starting point known as a seed.

BitGo supports following crypto-currency support: Bitcoin, Bitcoin cash, Bitcoin Gold, The Royal Mint, Ripple, Litecoin . BitGo enterprise api supports Ethereum and ERC-20 tokens.

The way the muti-sig wallet works is that there are 3 private keys involved. Out of which you need at-least 2 keys to perform a transaction like sending currency to someone.  If a user looses his/her personal private key, they can use the backup private key and BitGo uses its own private key to sign the transaction. BitGo provides a KeyCard, which stores all the private key relevant information for you.

All sensitive information on the KeyCard is encrypted with your passcode, or with a key which only BitGo has.

BitGo Provides a sleek user interface for enterprise wallets as follows:

BitGo wallet provides functionalities to generate Monthly statements.

Also, BitGo wallet provides a user friendly web interface to attach policies to the wallet or add new users/admin/spenders to a wallet. It also allows whitelisting of whom you can send bitcoin etc.

For the multi-sig to work BitGo holds a private and public key. BitGo will automatically sign a transaction along with a users wallet private key.

Not only that the most important feature of BitGo, is their enterprise API’s and SDK’s solution for 3rd parties to create multisig wallets and perform various operations. The api documentation is provided here.

The BitGo SDK enables the following:

• Creation of multi-signature wallets
• Wallet balance and transaction listing
• Transaction creation and signing
• Transaction monitoring and notifications
• Secure user authentication
• Multi-user workflows for use in enterprise environments
• Policies and spending limits

The Good:

• Leader in multi-signature wallets.
• Provides easy implementation for Hierarchical Deterministic Wallets.
• Provides key recovery services.
• BitGo provides a platform and services for payments, processing, treasury management, risk, compliance, logistics, B2B and B2C applications.
• BitGo supports most of the widely used crypto-currencies and ERC-20 tokens.
• Multiple options to generate backup keys, either through passcode or public key.
• BitGo provides additional layer of security by not directly sharing your private keys, but encrypting them with your passcode.
• Provides a feature called BitGo Instant for faster payments.

The Bad:

• BitGo does not provide Mobile SDK’s.
• Ethereum and ERC-20 tokens client wallets are still not supported. Only enterprise support through shapeshift for those.
• BitGo consumer does not provide any tool for tax data purposes, like the other competitors like Coinbase etc.
• With advent of Ethereum, Multisig usecases have become easier to implement with smart contracts , for example here.
• Maximum multisig parties is around 15 as compared to Ethereum based smart contract Multisig which can be 50.