GreenAddress, a Malta-based user-friendly multisig wallet with advanced security and privacy has announced the enabling of SegWit on its bitcoin wallets. In addition to SegWit, the company has announced a multitude of other upgrades which you can read below.

First off, GreenAddress has boosted its team with two new developers joining to work on the platform. This should help the company work through its list of enhancements and updates noted below much faster now with the extra brainpower on board.

Secondly, the platform has recently moved to a new support system which made it easier to track and quickly respond to support requests via their support email info@greenaddress.it. Much like other companies in the space, GreenAddress has reported the number of support queries has been steadily increasing, but response time has been reduced with the new system.

Further, the GreenAddress FAQ has been updated to reflect some of the most recent common questions from users.

Upgrading to SegWit

GreenAddress has supported SegWit in its testnet environment for a long time now, and with SegWit now locked in on the main chain, the company has deployed the changes needed to enable this to the main service.

On users next log into their wallet, they will be upgraded to SegWit and offered the chance to opt-out. If a user does not see the upgrade prompt, the client being used is outdated and the users will need to update to the latest version. Once SegWit is enabled on a user’s account and they have generated at least one recipient address, it will be locked in and users will no longer be able to disable it.

To note, SegWit is fully backward compatible with the rest of the Bitcoin ecosystem, users should notice no differences with SegWit enabled except cheaper fees.

GreenAddress testing shows that SegWit fees are around half the cost of the equivalent non-SegWit transaction. Lower fees kick in once a user starts spending SegWit inputs, so for most users, it will take a few transactions before they see the full effects. As the rest of the ecosystem updates, GreenAddress expect block pressure to reduce which may also lower fees further.

GreenAddress is strongly recommending that all users upgrade their wallet apps to the latest available versions to pick up recent updates and fixes and to ensure that transaction fees are as low as possible. Also, the company suggests that users get into the habit of checking their fees before sending transactions. When fees are high, users can often save money by delaying transactions to quieter times like late at night and the weekend.

Recovery updates

GreenAddress also announced their new replacement recovery tool “garecovery” has completed internal testing and is now available at https://github.com/greenaddress/garecovery. garecovery has support for SegWit as well as now supporting 2 of 3 wallets, and can be run on testnet for users who wish to validate or experiment with the recovery process.

GreenAddress says they plan to improve garecovery even further in the future. For example, they will look to improve the privacy impact of recovering inputs sent to the same address.

Bitcoin Cash Withdrawals

GreenAddress investigated the options open and has settled upon providing API support for signing the GreenAddress side of bitcoin cash transactions for users to allow them to split manually.

Developers can see the API documentation for the call vault.sign_alt_tx at https://api.greenaddress.it/vault.html#sign_alt_tx for more information.

Please note that this call respects the wallets two-factor settings and will only sign with the bcash fork id replay protection mechanism, and only with keys under the user’s GreenAddress path.

GreenAddress does not provide tools or support for the splitting process beyond providing the API call. In particular, the company will not be providing a split tool or making any changes to its wallets to support bitcoin cash at all. As there is already at least one community provided tool to split 2 of 3 accounts, it is now possible a tool for 2 of 2 will be developed too. GreenAddress urges all users to be careful about third-party services to split coins and reminds users that maintaining the security of mnemonics and two-factor is their sole responsibility.

Users should not expect that future splits or altcoin air-drops will be supported, in line with the company’s previous statements on contentious hard forks.

API Examples

GreenAddress also announced a new repository of simple python examples using the GreenAddress API to talk to the service at https://github.com/greenaddress/gaexamples. The company says they will be updating the API documentation to refer to these and adding more examples as time allows.

Pricing Sources

GreenAddress has now updated all wallets that were using BTC-E for pricing data to BitcoinAverage.com instead.

If a user had a spending limit setup in fiat and was using BTC-E, GreenAddress has reset their limit to zero as part of this change. To get another source, users can change this (and update spending limits) in the settings of all of the wallets.

For New Zealand users, the company now supports Kiwi-Coin as an NZD pricing source in addition to Local Bitcoin.

Client Updates

GreenBits has recently been updated with a variety of changes including UI updates, transaction limits, improved RBF and more validation to ensure users have backed up their mnemonics and are using the correct PIN.

Cordova and CRX wallets have also been updated with bug fixes, improved fees, and better SegWit support.

GreenAddress also stated they have a native iOS wallet in development which will provide a better native experience for iPhone users.

Longer Term

The GreenAddress team is updating their Cordova/JavaScript clients to share more code with the rest of our codebase. This will result in a faster and smoother experience for users with new features rolling out on all our wallets simultaneously.

For system integrators, the company is also developing a higher-level API abstraction which will handle many of the low-level details such as transaction construction on behalf users. This will make it much easier to integrate for users providing services backed by GreenAddress and for developers to automate wallet workflows.

The company says they will shortly begin development work on using CSV to replace nlocktime emails. This change will allow recovery of 2/2 funds without needing to receive or store nlocktime zip files and make recovery for lost two-factor much easier.