First Bitcoin insurance service launches in UK and with it comes a Fort Know-style vault

Elliptic Vault, is the world’s first facility to offer insurance to owners of the Bitcoin virtual currency, has been launched in the UK. It is known as the Fort Knox of the virtual world. The private encrypted Bitcoin keys are stored on offline servers in a secure location.

With some online and mobile casinos starting to offer bitcoins as a payment option, this virtual currency looks all set to grow even further.

Online wallets that store the digital currency have been subject to a number of recent cyber-attacks with some users having also suffered from accidental loss, so the smart strategy is to use a virtual vault, as there is no way of getting them back once they have gone.

Tangible security for the intangible

Tom Robinson, Elliptic Vault’s co-founder, said the new service will address this “deep concern” amongst owners and users of the digital currency. “One of the main concerns people have with Bitcoin is that it’s quite difficult to store securely,” Robinson said.

Despite his confidence in the new service, Robinson said it was difficult to convince an insurance company to trust the virtual currency. “It was very difficult to find an insurer as the industry is very conservative and they did not understand Bitcoin.”