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### What You Need To Know

 - On August 1st, 2017 there will be a User Activated Soft Fork (UASF) implementing Bitcoin Improvement Proposal 148 increasing the block size. There are other things happening with Bitcoin in the week or so leading up to this, so best to have your Bitcoin secured before July 21st.
- There is a minority of Nodes and Miners who will not be implementing this update and who will continue running the legacy protocol.
- This **_may_** result in two different versions of Bitcoin. For the purposes of this discussion we can call them Bitcoin Legacy and Bitcoin 148.
- The Blockchain is a ledger of all the transactions that have ever occurred on Bitcoin. Essentially the full record of every transfer of Bitcoin from one wallet to another.
- The Blockchain for Bitcoin Legacy and Bitcoin 148 will be identical before the UASF but from that point forward they will diverge.
- If you have Bitcoin before the UASF, then that means you will have Bitcoin in the pre-USAF Blockchain ledger and therefore should own an identical amount of Bitcoin Legacy and Bitcoin 148.
- If you are using a Third Party service to hold or validate your Bitcoin (such as an online wallet or an exchange account) then you need to ensure that they will be supporting both divergent chains after the UASF, and you will also need to trust them to do it properly.
- Alternately you can personally secure and verify your own Bitcoin. This requires a bit of effort and technical ability, but does not require you to trust any third party and is the preferable option. Paper wallets can offer the strongest security in this regard.
- If the UASF results in only a temporary divergence into two forms of Bitcoin with subsequent reunification, then transactions that occurred on the minority chain immediately after the UASF may be lost forever.

### TL/DR Summary:
There is some turbulence coming up with Bitcoin which may result in a split. To ensure the safety of your Bitcoin you will need to take measures to secure it properly before July 21st. Ideally you will put your Bitcoin into what is called "Cold Storage," meaning it is stored in a secure form that isn't vulnerable to hacking. This can be an offline device or for an even higher level of security you can use a set of paper wallets.

## Resources:

One of the most comprehensive methods of securing your Bitcoin is described in the Glacier Protocol. The level of security represented by the protocol is frankly bordering on paranoia. For those who feel they don't require that intense level of security can follow instructions on how to simplify the procedure to eliminate some of the less useful and more costly (in terms of time, effort and/or money) elements. For the complete guide, visit [Glacier Protocol](https://glacierprotocol.org/).

One of the more well respected tools you can use in conjunction with the Glacier Protocol is the Armory wallet. This is an Open Source wallet for Bitcoin which supports Cold Storage and Multi-Signature security. For example, you can use this to store your Bitcoin in such a way that four paper wallets are generated and any two of these are required in order to withdraw/recover your stored Bitcoin. In this case, one might store each of the four paper wallets in different secure locations. For more information on this wallet, visit [Armory Wallet](https://www.bitcoinarmory.com/).

If you are new to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies the following videos may be useful:

### Bitcoin
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### Litecoin
<iframe width="560" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/JRr5VGtWTXI" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

### Ethereum and Blockchain
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