Wallet Logo

ECOS: Crypto Mining & Wallet

Latest release: 1.27.0 ( 30th June 2022 ) 🔍 Last analysed 7th October 2021 . Custodial: The provider holds the keys
3.9 ★★★★★
82 ratings
25th November 2020

Jump to verdict 

Help spread awareness for build reproducibility

Please help us spread the word discussing the risks of centralized custodians with ECOS: Crypto Mining & Wallet  via their Twitter!

Do your own research!

Try out searching for "lost bitcoins", "stole my money" or "scammers" together with the wallet's name, even if you think the wallet is generally trustworthy. For all the bigger wallets you will find accusations. Make sure you understand why they were made and if you are comfortable with the provider's reaction.

If you find something we should include, you can create an issue or edit this analysis yourself and create a merge request for your changes.

The Analysis 

(Analysis from Android review)

App Description

From Google Play:

We make crypto simple for everyone. ECOS provides a simple way to save, exchange, mine and send cryptocurrencies. If you are new to crypto, then our app is the solution you need. It provides all crypto tools for both investment strategies: long-term and short-term

ECOS is an investment platform and thus not primarily a bitcoin wallet.

The Site

From the About Us page, ECOS claims that its mission

is to provide the user with simple, safe, reliable and effective tools for digital assets’ management and to develop its ecosystem around the world.

Terms and Conditions

From Withdrawal, 1.10.2:

Withdrawals may be performed only after identification and security checks are completed and approved by ECOS-M.

From 3.3. Digital Wallet And Private Keys:

The Customer’s digital wallet or vault may require a private key, or a combination of private keys, for access. Accordingly, loss of requisite private key(s) associated with the Customer’s digital wallet or vault storing Hash Rate Output will result in loss of such Hash Rate Output, access to the Customer’s Hash Rate Output balance and/or any initial balances in blockchains.

This is confusing to our review as the private keys are not mentioned anywhere else on the app or website.

The App

We tried the app and registered an account. We were not provided with 12-word key phrases. Wallets did not have private keys and we could not find a way to view or export them.

It is possible to send and receive assets via bitcoin addresses.

Contact

We reached out to ECOS’ official twitter account and asked if there is a way to export private keys.

We will update this analysis once we receive a response.

Verdict

Due to the information we have collected thus far, we conclude that this app is custodial and does not provide the user with private keys. Thus, it is not verifiable.

(dg)

Verdict Explained

As the provider of this product holds the keys, verifiability of the product is not relevant to the security of the funds!

As part of our Methodology, we ask:

Custodial!

Is the product self-custodial?

If the answer is "no", we mark it as "Custodial: The provider holds the keys".

A custodial service is a service where the funds are held by a third party like the provider. The custodial service can at any point steal all the funds of all the users at their discretion. Our investigations stop there.

Some services might claim their setup is super secure, that they don’t actually have access to the funds, or that the access is shared between multiple parties. For our evaluation of it being a wallet, these details are irrelevant. They might be a trustworthy Bitcoin bank and they might be a better fit for certain users than being your own bank but our investigation still stops there as we are only interested in wallets.

Products that claim to be non-custodial but feature custodial accounts without very clearly marking those as custodial are also considered “custodial” as a whole to avoid misguiding users that follow our assessment.

This verdict means that the provider might or might not publish source code and maybe it is even possible to reproduce the build from the source code but as it is custodial, the provider already has control over the funds, so it is not a wallet where you would be in exclusive control of your funds.

We have to acknowledge that a huge majority of Bitcoiners are currently using custodial Bitcoin banks. If you do, please:

  • Do your own research if the provider is trust-worthy!
  • Check if you know at least enough about them so you can sue them when you have to!
  • Check if the provider is under a jurisdiction that will allow them to release your funds when you need them?
  • Check if the provider is taking security measures proportional to the amount of funds secured? If they have a million users and don’t use cold storage, that hot wallet is a million times more valuable for hackers to attack. A million times more effort will be taken by hackers to infiltrate their security systems.
The product cannot be independently verified. If the provider puts your funds at risk on purpose or by accident, you will probably not know about the issue before people start losing money. If the provider is more criminally inclined he might have collected all the backups of all the wallets, ready to be emptied at the press of a button. The product might have a formidable track record but out of distress or change in management turns out to be evil from some point on, with nobody outside ever knowing before it is too late.