<p>The purpose of checksums is to ensure data integrity when transferring. Given that WIF means Wallet Import Format, the assumption is that any private key in this format is being transferred from one place to another, and generally people want a check that the transfer was done successfully. Having a checksum built into the format allows for an integrity check to be done quickly at import time to inform the user whether there are any obvious errors.</p>

CC BY-SA 4.0
2024-02-10T04:55:36.867Z
2024-02-10T04:55:36.867Z
Ava Chow
<p>Why does the WIF conversion process mandate the double-hash-and-append on the 80+privkey / 80+privkey+01 string, given that nobody is <em>questioning</em> the correctness of that privkey number?</p>

<private-key><wallet-import-format><checksum>
Why checksum the privkey in WIF?
Lilacrail
# Why checksum the privkey in WIF?

(Asked by: username_0 on 2024-02-10)

Why does the WIF conversion process mandate the double-hash-and-append on the 80+privkey / 80+privkey+01 string, given that nobody is *questioning* the correctness of that privkey number?

**Tags:** private-key, wallet-import-format, checksum


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## 1 answers

### Answer by username_1 on 2024-02-10. Score: 4

The purpose of checksums is to ensure data integrity when transferring. Given that WIF means Wallet Import Format, the assumption is that any private key in this format is being transferred from one place to another, and generally people want a check that the transfer was done successfully. Having a checksum built into the format allows for an integrity check to be done quickly at import time to inform the user whether there are any obvious errors.


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