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Moderate 62 Bitcoin

bugfix: reject non-ASCII BIP-39 passphrases

Public commit record

What the developer wrote

Authored by scgbckbone

45/100 · Thin
bugfix: reject non-ASCII BIP-39 passphrases
✓ Descriptive subject✓ Names a concrete action or component! No meaningful explanatory body
The short version

What changed, and why it matters

This update fixes a bug where COLDCARD wallets would accept BIP-39 passphrases containing non-ASCII characters (like accented letters or emojis) or non-printable characters. Because different wallet software normalizes such characters differently, the same passphrase could silently produce a different wallet address on COLDCARD than on another app. The fix now rejects those passphrases outright, preventing users from accidentally creating funds they later cannot access or reconcile with other wallets.

Recommended action

Users should upgrade to a firmware release containing this fix. Until then, avoid using non-ASCII or non-printable characters in BIP-39 passphrases, and verify any existing passphrase-derived wallets against other BIP-39 software before relying on them for funds.

Security signals we found

01

Behavioral fix that prevents silent derivation of incompatible wallet seeds

02

Input validation added for BIP-39 passphrase across USB, UI, saved-passphrase restore, and note/password lanes

03

Rejection of non-printable ASCII and non-ASCII Unicode characters

04

Test coverage added for Unicode normalization edge cases (NFC/NFD), emoji, tab, newline, and QR entry paths

Risk score

Why this scored 62/100

Our methodology →
Potential impact 18/30
Exploitability 12/25
Stealth signal 10/15
Affected reach 10/15
Confidence 8/10
Evidence quality 4/5
Human-validated context

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