Bryan Bishop publishes working presigned Bitcoin vault prototype
Bryan Bishop published a working Python prototype of a presigned Bitcoin vault design intended to make theft attempts detectable and recoverable.
In April, developer Bryan Bishop released a prototype of a Bitcoin vault design based on pre-signed, time-locked transactions and ephemeral keys. The design aimed to give an owner or watchtower time to react if a key was compromised and an attacker tried to move vaulted funds.
The prototype demonstrated that useful vault behavior could be approximated with existing Bitcoin capabilities, while also including a version using the proposed OP_CHECKTEMPLATEVERIFY covenant opcode. It was a proof of concept, not a new consensus feature or a production custody standard.
Vault research mattered because self-custody security is not only about protecting a key; it can also be about constraining what a stolen key is allowed to do. Bishop's prototype made that distinction concrete in running code.