Is It Safe to Share Your Ethereum Address?

Written by Ricky Nave in Crypto

Every Ethereum account has two key pieces of information: a private key (sometimes represented as a 12-word seed phrase) and an address (sometimes also called a public address, ETH address, or wallet address). The private key essentially serves the role of a password to access the account and send cryptocurrency to other accounts. Your private key should NEVER be shared with anyone for any reason whatsoever. But what about your address? Is it safe to share your Ethereum address?

Yes, it is completely safe to share your Ethereum address with anyone. You can even share your Ethereum address with the entire internet by posting it on social media without any risk of Ethereum account hacks.

In fact, Ethereum was cryptographically designed so that unlike a bank account number, an Ethereum address can be shared without any risk to the account. This security is built into the Ethereum blockchain which means it holds true regardless of whether you use Metamask, Trust Wallet, or any other software or hardware wallet.

Ricky Nave

In college, Ricky studied physics & math, won a prestigious research competition hosted by Oak Ridge National Laboratory, started several small businesses including an energy chewing gum business and a computer repair business, and graduated with a thesis in algebraic topology. After graduating, Ricky attended grad school at Duke University in the mathematics PhD program where he worked on quantum algorithms & non-Euclidean geometry models for flexible proteins. He also worked in cybersecurity at Los Alamos during this time before eventually dropping out of grad school to join a startup working on formal semantic modeling for legal documents. Finally, he left that startup to start his own in the finance & crypto space. Now, he helps entrepreneurs pay less capital gains tax.

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