<p>By the definition.</p>

<p>Crypto is "unrecoverable money". If you dont like it - just dont use it. Point.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-23T05:20:49.177Z
2018-03-23T05:20:49.177Z
amaclin
<p>Key generation in Bitcoin, as in many cryptographic protocols, is based on generating a random value used to create the private key, and then deriving the public key from it. </p>

<p>In Bitcoin such random value should be picked uniformly at random from a 256 bit space. There are <code>115792089237316195423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639936</code> different values in 256 bits, so if the source of randomness is good enough the odds of selecting the same value twice are negligible. Therefore, if you lose your private key, generating the same again is almost imposible, at least nowadays. </p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-23T12:31:40.450Z
2018-03-23T12:31:40.450Z
sr_gi
<p>Technically, private keys are unrecoverable because of the properties of the ECDSA algorithm used in. Bitcoin uses ECDSA algorithm to create a public key from your private key, which makes it impossible to compute back your private by knowing your public key(address).
After BIP 39, we can recover private keys from 12 word seed phrase. It's good. But if it too lost, nothing can be done.
What can we do is write down the seed phrase somewhere safe. That's all.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-23T06:14:09.327Z
2018-03-23T08:30:10.553Z
2018-03-23T08:30:10.553Z
Prayag k
<p>If you create independent private keys, it is infeasible to recreate them due to the vast size of the key space.</p>

<p>However, there are some methodologies to derive keys from an initial seed that is easy to backup and can be used to deterministically recreate the same keys again. These schemes are generally referred to as "Hierarchical Deterministic Wallets".</p>

<p>Most wallets today use such a scheme to create private keys.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-23T17:50:38.970Z
2018-03-23T17:50:38.970Z
Murch
<p>Why were lost bitcoin private keys made unrecoverable?</p>

<p>Is there a way to do this and if not shouldn't a way be created since people will lose their money.</p>

CC BY-SA 3.0
2018-03-23T05:44:07.223Z
The whole point of the cryptocurrency is lack of the trusted third party. Without that each and every user is responsible for his assets. Think about private keys in bitcoin not in terms of bank account (trusted third party) but in terms of old-fashioned coin purse. When you loose it, you cannot ask anybody to reimburse you.
Michał Zabielski
<private-key><recover-private-key>
Why were private keys made unrecoverable?
Errol
# Why were private keys made unrecoverable?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2018-03-23)

Why were lost bitcoin private keys made unrecoverable?

Is there a way to do this and if not shouldn't a way be created since people will lose their money.

**Tags:** private-key, recover-private-key

> **Comments:**
> **username_1**: The whole point of the cryptocurrency is lack of the trusted third party. Without that each and every user is responsible for his assets. Think about private keys in bitcoin not in terms of bank account (trusted third party) but in terms of old-fashioned coin purse. When you loose it, you cannot ask anybody to reimburse you.  

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## 4 answers

### Answer by username_2 on 2018-03-23. Score: 2

By the definition.

Crypto is "unrecoverable money". If you dont like it - just dont use it. Point.


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### Answer by username_3 on 2018-03-23. Score: 1

Key generation in Bitcoin, as in many cryptographic protocols, is based on generating a random value used to create the private key, and then deriving the public key from it.

In Bitcoin such random value should be picked uniformly at random from a 256 bit space. There are `115792089237316195423570985008687907853269984665640564039457584007913129639936` different values in 256 bits, so if the source of randomness is good enough the odds of selecting the same value twice are negligible. Therefore, if you lose your private key, generating the same again is almost imposible, at least nowadays.


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### Answer by username_4 on 2018-03-23. Score: 1

Technically, private keys are unrecoverable because of the properties of the ECDSA algorithm used in. Bitcoin uses ECDSA algorithm to create a public key from your private key, which makes it impossible to compute back your private by knowing your public key(address).
After BIP 39, we can recover private keys from 12 word seed phrase. It's good. But if it too lost, nothing can be done.
What can we do is write down the seed phrase somewhere safe. That's all.


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### Answer by username_5 on 2018-03-23. Score: 0

If you create independent private keys, it is infeasible to recreate them due to the vast size of the key space.

However, there are some methodologies to derive keys from an initial seed that is easy to backup and can be used to deterministically recreate the same keys again. These schemes are generally referred to as "Hierarchical Deterministic Wallets".

Most wallets today use such a scheme to create private keys.


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