Getting in on the cryptocurrency wave almost feels like it’s a must for everyone alive today. Either you hope to get in as a trader or long-term investor, nobody wants to miss out on the wave expected to change how we transact with currencies in the future. But like every outstanding human achievement, today’s crypto world is rife with scammers and fake exchangers looking for unsuspecting cryptocurrency enthusiasts to cheat out of their hard-earned money.
As a beginner in the game, though by now, you have probably heard of these criminals. However, you must understand that knowing about their activities is not the same as knowing how to spot them when they are unto you and possibly escape scot-free. These guys are so good that even veteran crypto players are not entirely immune from their grasps. But before you start sweating, you should know we got you covered on how to be safe from their attacks.
Newbies in the crypto game must note certain of things about cryptocurrency exchange before making up their minds on creating accounts with it. Of the things to consider, the size of the exchanger and the security of its asset holdings are factors that you must strictly watch out for. In this article, we’ve gone to extra lengths to get you everything you need to know on choosing the best exchange for your coins.
While we are not here to tell you exactly which exchange to choose from, we want your coins to be in safe hands; hence, we will only mention exchangers whose services we have personally checked out.
How to Identify if an Exchange is Large Enough or not
One of the mistakes beginners in the crypto world make is that they do not consider the size of the exchange when searching for the right one for their portfolio. They make this mistake because they do not understand the roles liquidity plays in the services delivered by exchanges.
Going with an exchange that has a large trading volume means your portfolio is quite liquid. With such exchange, buying or selling crypto assets will be of no hassle as its large trading volume means constant trading is happening through it. There are always traders ready to take the opposite side of whichever transaction you might try to initiate at any time. The transaction fees you pay will also not be much as a result of this, unlike exchanges with low activities, where traders have had to pay ludicrous transaction fees due to their low trading volume.
Virtually every exchange you come across will claim to offer enough liquidity, but you must be aware that many of them only tell you this to get your money. On the other hand, exchanges like Binance, Coinbase, and Redot have proven track records for having enough liquidity.
How to Check if It is Secure
At this stage, you are probably wondering how you can spot which exchange is secure or not since your awareness has been raised already to the existence of the shady ones. It’s for this reason we list three essential factors to look out for when choosing exchanges. An exchange lacking in any of these is not suitable for you:
Storage: Saving a large chunk of its crypto assets in cold storage is a pretty effective way for an exchange to protect itself against cybercriminals that might try to hack it. An exchange can guarantee it has your best interest at heart if some of its assets are saved offline. With that, you know for sure that if it gets hacked and its funds get withdrawn, there’s assurance that your wallet holding can be refunded. Of course, how much is saved offline also matters.
Secured Access: We cannot emphasize enough the importance of 2 factors authentication and a strong password for your wallet. If an exchange cannot go as far as providing 2FA to get access into your crypto portfolio, and if it does not reject the use of a weak password when registering, you know with certainty that it doesn’t take the security of your asset seriously enough. So, you will be doing yourself a whole lot of favor by avoiding such exchange.
Secured connection: An excellent way to spot a less secured exchange is by checking its web link. A secured website will start with “HTTPS,” When you visit a site starting with only “HTTP,” it means it is not secured with an SSL certificate. As a result, any data you insert in it, private or otherwise, is unprotected and can be easily intercepted without your awareness. So, if an exchange can’t provide a secured connection, you should stay away.
Basic Cybersecurity Precautions to Take
If you consider the security of your money and data necessary, you must endeavor not to take everything we’ve stated so far lightly. But following those steps are not enough. You can never really be too careful when it comes to securing your assets. It is why we went deep enough in our research to bring to you four more cybersecurity measures you must take note of when starting out dealing with cryptocurrencies.
- Only go into business with a credible exchange. As stated earlier, size does matter when you choose which exchange to go into business with as a newbie. Remember that the bigger an exchange is, the more likely it is to be credible.
- Do away with public Wi-Fi. And even when making use of your private internet connection, you are advised to make use of a good VPN. All this is necessary to protect your data from prying eyes online that might be looking for the slightest weak point they can use to strike against you.
- Use a good antivirus in your device and keep your device’s apps and software updated at all times.
- Use strong passwords. When creating passwords for your account on sites, use passwords containing a mix of numerals, alphabets, and symbols. Remember that the stronger your password is, the more secure your assets.
- 2 Factor Authentication is critical. So, when you get offered the option to use a 2FA to access your account, take it immediately.
Best Licensed Exchanges you can Choose.
To save you the stress of going through every exchange shoved to your face when you do a Google search, we have scoured the web to bring to you the five best cryptocurrency exchanges from which you can choose. The list is in no particular order of how great they are, so you can choose whichever one you find pleasing the most:
- Binance
- Redot
- Coinbase
- Robinhood
- Gemini