How To Move Your WAX Account To Your Ledger
WAX accounts have become very easy to use with the WAX Cloud Wallet, but for those who do not plan on using their account regularly, a more secure account, such as a WAX account using a Ledger device is often preferred. In this article, we will explain how to move your current account to your Ledger device.
Why would you use a Ledger?
With the wide availability of crypto wallets, with some, such as the WAX Cloud Wallet, even allowing you to login using your social accounts, you might be wondering why you would use a hardware wallet like a Ledger.
Hardware wallets tend to be relatively inconvenient, somewhat slow, and are not suited well for everyday use. So, why use them? Hardware wallets are used for only one reason, which is maximum security.
Private keys generated using the hardware wallet never leave the wallet, and transactions need to be physically authorized on the device before they can be executed. This means nobody is able to access the contents of your wallet unless they have physical access to the device AND know your pin code, even if the computer to which the hardware wallet is connected, is compromised.
This makes hardware wallets an extremely safe choice for those who need maximum security of their assets, despite their inconveniences.
Moving your account to your Ledger
Let’s start moving your account to your Ledger. In order to continue, you will need to have access to the keys of your account. This means you won’t be able to transfer your WAX Cloud Wallet account to your Ledger. Instead, you can make a new account using your Ledger using our tutorial (this article describes the process using an existing account in Scatter, to do this with the WAX Cloud Wallet, login to Bloks using the Cloud Wallet instead of Scatter).
Lastly, we recommend making yourself familiar with how WAX accounts work before continuing. We have published a guide which explains all aspects of WAX accounts, which you can find here.
Preparing your Ledger
Now let’s move on to preparing your Ledger. Before you can start creating a new account using your Ledger, you need to make sure your Ledger has the latest firmware and has the EOS app (there is no WAX app you need to install) installed. If you have already completed this step, continue to the next part. If not, start off by downloading and installing the official Ledger Live application on your pc.
Once you have installed the Ledger Live app, connect your Ledger and unlock it, then open the Ledger Live app. In the app, navigate to the ‘Manager’ tab, accept the action on your Ledger, and verify that there are no firmware updates available for your Ledger, and if there are updates available, follow the steps to update the firmware to the latest version.
When you are certain your Ledger has the latest firmware, it’s time to install the EOS Ledger app on your device. From the ‘Manager’ page in the Ledger Live app, select the EOS app from the list, and click ‘Install’. After the app has been installed you can continue to the next part and start generating your keys!
Generating keys
The Ledger Live application does not support the generation of keys, so we will use Scatter to generate our keys. Scatter is a desktop application which supports WAX, and can be used to access WAX dApps. Scatter can be downloaded from here.
After you have installed Scatter, the first thing you have to do is activate the WAX network under the ‘Networks’ tab in the menu on the left in Scatter. Select ‘Wax Blockchain’ from the list of networks, and activate it.
*Before continuing, make sure your Ledger is still unlocked and has the EOS app opened
The next step is importing keys into Scatter from your Ledger. Click ‘Import key’ in the ‘Wallet’ tab (on the bottom right). In this menu, click ‘Hardware’, which will take you to the following screen:
On this screen, select the Ledger device you are using, and choose any key index (the key at each index remains the same, no matter which computer you use, as long as you use the same Ledger device). Scatter will then show you the key associated with the key index, and you are able to click on it, which adds the key to your Scatter.
We recommend writing the index of your key down, as you might want to import the same key on a different device in the future or you might want to recover it in the future.
For maximum security, perform this process twice, in order to import 2 keys into your Scatter. Importing 2 keys means you can have different keys for both the owner and the active permission. You can also choose to use the same key for both permissions.
Changing the keys of your account
Now you are sure your Ledger is ready and you have generated the keys which you want to use for your account, you can start changing the keys of the account. By ‘changing the keys of your account’, we simply mean changing the keys associated with the permissions of your account, which can be done using the following steps.
To start, go to Bloks and click ‘Login’ at the top right of the page. Login using the wallet on which you currently have your account, and make sure you login using the owner permission (when using the active permission you won’t be able to change all keys). When using Scatter, this will look like the image above.
Then, click on ‘Wallet’ in the navigation bar and go to the ‘Keys and Permissions’ section. In this section, enter the public keys of the keypairs you generated using your Ledger (as can be seen in the image below).
After having verified that you entered the correct keys, click ‘Change permissions’, and accept the transaction using your current wallet. Your account has now been completely ‘transferred’ to your Ledger, and you can start logging in using your Ledger (without Scatter), or using Scatter (then you should complete the next step).
Making the account visible in Scatter
There is only one step left before you can start using the newly created account, which is refreshing the accounts linked to the key in Scatter.
To refresh the linked accounts, go to the options menu on the right of the key and click ‘Refresh Accounts’. Scatter will then link the key to the permission on your account.
After following the above steps, you can now use both Scatter and the Ledger (directly, without Scatter) to gain access to your account through tools like the Bloks wallet. Keep in mind that you always need to connect and unlock your Ledger (and Scatter if you are using it) before you try to login on a dApp/tool.
About us
Founding block producer for the EOS mainnet. Telos, Lynx, BOS, and FIO Block Producer. Active top WAX Guild. Partner in the Europechain sister chain. Investor in blockchain projects. Governance, intercultural cooperation, and security specialist. You can find us here:
EOS, Europechain, and Lynx Block Producer name: eosamsterdam
BOS Block Producer name: amsterdambos
Telos Block Producer name: amsterdam
FIO Block Producer name: bp@eosamsterdam
WAX Guild name: amsterdamwax
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Written by Yannick Slenter for EOS Amsterdam
