Internet2 - Wasabi
Faster with Wasabi on the Internet2 Cloud Exchange. Choose hot cloud storage, where your data is always available, faster and cheaper than you thought possible, whether …
Last updated
Faster with Wasabi on the Internet2 Cloud Exchange. Choose hot cloud storage, where your data is always available, faster and cheaper than you thought possible, whether …
Last updated
CoinJoin-enabled: CoinJoin is a mechanism that guarantees privacy in Bitcoin transactions by breaking the link of which input pays which output, preventing the output from knowing the owner of the input.
Enhanced privacy via Tor integration: Because there is a lot of communication between Bitcoin nodes, users can be de-anonymized. But the wallet can use both locally installed or automatic Tor integrations to mask the IP address of Bitcoin users, enhancing privacy.
Free and open-source: Besides being free, Wasabi is open-source, giving users more control over the software they run. This way, tech-savvy users can configure the software to suit their needs.
Supports only one crypto asset: Wasabi Wallet supports only Bitcoin, making it unsuitable for investors who want to manage several assets at the same time in a single wallet.
No mobile version: Wasabi Wallet only offers a desktop version, making it is a deal-breaker for users who desire to manage their crypto assets remotely with a smartphone.
Wasabi is a non-custodial hot wallet that requires a connection to the internet and cryptocurrency network to work. As a wallet, Wasabi values user privacy and anonymity. This is evident in its built-in CoinJoin, coin control, and Tor integration features that help to keep users and their IP addresses anonymous. This further prevents security breaches and data leaks.
Wasabi does not offer users the opportunity to earn passive income and rewards through staking, unlike some other wallets that do. Another drawback is Wasabi Wallet's support of Bitcoin only.
Since its launch, the wallet has maintained some level of security without a report of any major security breaches. At the point of installation and setup, the wallet's users are issued a 12-word seed phrase which is a randomly generated string of words that can be used to back up the wallet or access it should a user’s device get lost or damaged.
Being a non-custodial wallet, users have total custody over their funds and are at liberty to secure their wallets with a password. It is important to keep the 12-word backup phrase and password safe to retain access to the wallet's contents.
Wasabi is a hierarchical deterministic (HD) wallet, making it generate a new crypto address to receive payments and secure funds. It uses a BIP 44 account hierarchy for deterministic wallets, enabling a user to generate countless addresses and have them securely backed up with the 12-word recovery phrase.
To keep users private and anonymous, a new address is always generated for every transaction. Operating the wallet does not require any form of Know-Your-Customer (KYC) module. During transactions, wallet users have the option to make use of CoinJoin. CoinJoin is an anonymization method for Bitcoin transactions that also eliminates the risk of funds disappearing or being stolen.
CoinJoin allows users to mix their coins together with others to perform a transaction. This way, the recipient does not know who the actual sender of such a transaction is. Performing a CoinJoin transaction with Wasabi involves launching the wallet, selecting a maximum of seven coins with a value of at least 0.1 BTC, specifying an anonymity set, entering your password, clicking “Enqueue Selected Coins,’’ and waiting for the transaction to be completed.
Downloading and setting up the wallet is easy. To set up the wallet, visit the official website, wasabiwallet.io, and download the version that is compatible with your device (Linux, Windows, or MacOS).
Next click on the downloaded software to install it. After launching the wallet, generate a new wallet, set a unique name for it, and set a secure password that cannot be guessed by someone else.
Finally, a 12-word recovery phrase is randomly generated. This phrase must be carefully backed up as it will be needed to recover your password on a different device or wallet software.
EASY TO USE Wasabi is designed to be a user friendly Bitcoin wallet, that handles its users' privacy automatically under the hood, including network connections, input selection and coinjoining.
COMPREHENSIVE The wallet uses WabiSabi, an anonymous credential scheme that was designed to enable more accessible and efficient coinjoins. It allows users to utilize the best privacy tool without requiring a large amount of bitcoin in the wallet.
AFFORDABLE Coinjoining coins with a value above 0.01 BTC costs 0.3% as a coordinator fee + mining fees. Inputs of 0.01 BTC or below don't pay coordinator fees, nor remixes, even after one transaction. Thus, a payment made with coinjoined funds allows the sender and the recipient to remix their coins without paying any coordinator fees. If you’re reading this blog, you’ve probably already made two good decisions. The first is that you’ve decided to backup Microsoft Office 365. It could either be your Office 365 or your client’s Office 365. Either way, it’s a great move. Office 365 is not just email or Exchange online, it also comes with SharePoint online, and OneDrive for business and Teams. Depending on the license, Office applications like Word, PowerPoint, and Excel may also be included. But what’s not included is any kind of native backup feature.
Somewhere along the line (hopefully not here) you’ve learned that Microsoft Office 365 data can be vulnerable to malicious attacks and accidental deletion. Archive and Hold are two Office 365 features that are often mistaken as backup alternatives. When “Archive Mailbox” is enabled, Office 365 moves email data older than 2 years from the primary mailbox to the archive mailbox. This doesn’t copy any of the data. It is only moved from one location to another. Once an email is deleted, you have 30 days to retrieve it from the recycle bin, after that, it’s gone forever, and archive can’t help you. Using the “In-place Hold” feature keeps mailbox data in place for a specific number of days. This is good for compliance and legal policies, but it doesn’t make copies. So again, not a backup. In the case of OneDrive, there is a sync tool that some people think is a backup feature, but it only syncs your hard drive and cloud files. Sync and backup are not the same thing. If you delete your local copy, your cloud copy will soon be gone too. So, knowing all of this, it makes sense to use an Office 365 backup tool. Good decision #1.
Good decision #2 is using Veeam Backup for Microsoft Office 365 (VBO). It’s the #1 backup and recovery tool for Office 365.
It’s installed by 99,000 businesses worldwide It’s protecting over 10 million mailboxes It’s easy to use and affordable Veeam introduced VBO almost four years ago, and it became a great success because it’s simple, light, fast to deploy and the restore process is familiar to Veeam Backup & Recovery’s powerful granular restore. But one of the best reasons to use VBO is that it gives you options to store the backup data where you want; on premises or in cloud object storage.
Some users will choose to store their Office 365 backups on premises; which works out well if you have the storage capacity available. Many customers prefer the cloud for backup storage because of its lower cost and simplicity.
Now let’s look at the next big decision you’ll face – where to store the Office 365 backup data.
If you have existing capacity available on-prem, great. It makes sense to use it if you have it. If you don’t have capacity available on-prem, do you really want to consider buying more? Using a SaaS platform like Microsoft Office 365 means that you’ve already committed to moving more IT functions to the cloud so there is less to manage on-prem. Let cloud service providers manage software versions, power, cooling, racking & stacking equipment, and other operations. Backing up Office 365 to on-prem storage seems counterproductive.
So, if you’ve decided that on-prem storage is not the right decision for your backup data, because either you don’t have the existing capacity available or you don’t want to purchase more – then cloud object storage is the way to go. Again, the great thing about Veeam is that they give you plenty of choices.
Your cloud options include AWS, Azure, IBM, and of course, Wasabi. If you’re even the slightest bit familiar with Wasabi, you know that we pride ourselves on being less complex and significantly less expensive that AWS, Azure and the others. With Wasabi, if you know what your storage capacity is, you’ll know exactly what your cloud storage bill will be. Most people have no idea how much Office 365 data they need to protect. If it were on-prem Exchange or SharePoint, you could look at the database size to get an idea of how much capacity you need. For Office 365 you can log into the Admin Portal, use the side menu to find the “Reports” section and choose “usage”. You have options to find usage stats for each Office 365 application. You can see usage over 7 days, 30, 90, or 180 days. Use these growth figures to calculate growth as a percentage. With the Admin Portal and usage reports, you will know how much data you have, it’s percentage growth and therefore you will know how much cloud storage you need.
As I mentioned, with Wasabi, if you know the amount of storage you need for your backup data, you’ll be able to predict exactly what your cost is. When comparing the cost of Wasabi storage to the cost of other object storage offerings including AWS and Azure, it is important to look beyond the initial per-GB/mo price of the storage itself. This is because they have a host of other charges that will significantly increase the cost and unpredictability of their storage relative to Wasabi. Because AWS and Azure charge you for API calls, you need to somehow figure out how many PUT/COPY/POST (write actions) and GET (read actions) requests your Office 365 backup generates. The total number of requests can vary wildly depending on the read/write activity of your VBO. Unless you are a storage scientist, it can be quite challenging to estimate this value. With AWS and Azure surprise bills are fairly common. When you factor in all the egress and retrieval fees for any data you take out of AWS and Azure, the total monthly cost is often much higher than anticipated. Nobody seems to know what their AWS or Azure bill for Veeam Backup Office 365 is going to be month-to-month, and I can tell you that CFOs do not like radically unpredictable costs. It’s bad business.
At Wasabi, we believe cloud storage should be truly simple and truly affordable. And we put our money where our mouth is. We offer one product—with straightforward, predictable and economical pricing. With Wasabi you won’t have to try to make sense of confusing storage classes. And you won’t have to worry about being nickel and dimed for each API call and surprise egress charges.
Wasabi is significantly easier to understand and significantly less expensive than AWS, Azure and the others. We believe Wasabi is simply a better choice. Using Wasabi for Office 365 backup storage is great decision #3.
