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How to recover my wallet with guardians (on-chain) - complete guide

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Argent provides an option to recover some of your wallets on-chain (with guardians).

Recovery on-chain will be needed if you have no encrypted recovery kit saved previously or it is invalid (saved before another on-chain recovery happened, for example).

Accounts you can recover on-chain: 

  • Argent Vault
  • zkSync lite (automatically with Vault)
  • Starknet mobile wallet (upcoming)

Accounts you can't recover on-chain: 

  • Imported Argent X accounts (you will need to import them once again
  • Argent Web wallet
  • zkSync Era (deprecated)

Starting a recovery

  1. Install Argent on your phone and go through the onboarding slides
  2. Tap Get Started button
  3. Enter the email address you used to create your wallet and tap the arrow -> button. Read and accept Terms and conditions, then verify your email address per screen instructions. 
  4. If you used phone number, you will be prompted to verify it next. 
  5. The app will tell you Wallet detected if the email is right. Tap Restore wallet. 
  6. Choose a new passcode for your wallet and confirm it. You can toggle off Use Touch/Face ID to log in to use biometric authentication or leave it on as default. 
  7. Choose if you want to enable notifications (we recommend you do, as this will send you security notifications regarding your wallet activity)
  8. If you have saved an encrypted recovery kit (ERK) before and still have access to it, you can proceed with the off-chain recovery now. However if you do not have your ERK, tap Proceed without recovery.
    • It Argent support team suggested you do the on-chain recovery due to something being wrong with your ERK, and you still have it in your iCloud/Google Drive, move the file elsewhere, then the app will let you proceed with recovery on-chain. 
  9. You will need to acknowledge what can or can not be recovered. Once you mark all checkboxes, tap Continue.
  10. You will now see all your Argent accounts as Import available, Needs recovery or Deprecated (for Era account if you had it). Now you can individually recover each account. 
  11. Tap on the account you want to recover and proceed with the on-screen steps. 

Recovering Argent Vault

Quick reminders

  • You need at least 1 guardian to recover your wallet. If your Argent Vault is not activated, the recovery will include activation of the Vault, i.e. deployment of the smart contract. Activation will apply default Argent guardian to your wallet (i.e. your phone number and email verification)
  • If you have more than one guardian, you need a majority to approve a recovery. 
  • The recovery takes 48 hours. Why? This is a deliberate security layer as it gives you time to cancel any unwanted recovery attempts.
  • Unlike old fashioned Ethereum wallets, you do not need a seed phrase for a recovery (a piece of paper that acts like a password). 
  • You need to pay Ethereum network fee for the recovery transaction. If your Vault is inactive, the network fee would also include contract deployment.

Who can be a guardian?

How to start a recovery? 

  1. Tap on your Argent Vault (Ethereum account) that says Needs recovery in the list of accounts.
  2. Verify your email once more.
  3. Once a guardian gives their approval you will see a green check mark next to it.
  4. You need at least half of your guardians to approve a recovery, see the table: 
 Total guardians  Approvals needed
 1  1
 2  1
 3  2
 4  2
 N  ceil(N/2)

 

Recovery with default Argent guardian

  1. In the Argent app, tap on Argent in the list of guardians
  2. You'll receive a 6-digit code via SMS. Enter the code in Argent. The code is valid for 10 minutes.
  3. Verify the email sent to the email address partially shown in Argent. The verification link is valid for 10 minutes.

Recovery with a human guardian

If you have another Argent wallet owner as your guardian, they will be shown as 'Friend or Family guardian' in your guardian list. For security the name of this guardian is not visible.

To proceed with a recovery, call your guardian (speaking to them helps verify it's really them) and ask them to open their Argent wallet.

  1. Go to the Security tab.
  2. Tap Guardians > Who I protect.
  3. Tap your name in the list and in the 'Pending Requests' they will see 'Recover wallet'. They should tap 'Review'.
  4. They should confirm if the emojis they see match with yours. If the emojis do match, Approve your wallet recovery. (In the unlikely chance the emojis don't match, contact support@argent.xyz but do not Approve).

Recovery with MetaMask, Ledger, Trezor guardians

If you have MetaMask, Ledger, and/or Trezor wallets as your guardian(s), they'll be shown as 'Other guardian' in your guardian list. To use them for a recovery:

  1. Go to the Argent Security Center by entering security.argent.xyz in your web browser. (This is therefore outside of the Argent app).
  2. Click 'Recover a wallet'
  3. Choose your guardian type. 

For MetaMask

Make sure you are signed into your MetaMask account and have clicked MetaMask in the Argent Security Center:

  1. Enter your Argent username and click Connect
  2. In MetaMask - a popup will request a signature. Click Sign. 
  3. In the Argent Security Center - you'll see a set of emojis on the screen. Click Accept if the emojis match those you see in your wallet.
  4. In MetaMask - a new popup will request a signature. Click Sign.
  5. If the recovery is approved, you will get the success screen. Click Done. 

For Ledger wallet

(Before you start the recovery process please make sure you have the latest Ledger firmware. We also recommend using Chrome browser during the recovery)

Having clicked Ledger in the Argent Security Center:

  1. Connect your Ledger to your computer
  2. On your Ledger – Enter your pin and go to the Ethereum app (use Ledger Live to install it if you don’t have it).
  3. In the Argent Security Center – Enter your Argent username and click Connect
  4. In the Argent Security Center - you'll see a set of emojis on the screen. Click Accept if the emojis match those you see in your wallet. 
  5. On your Ledger - Sign 
  6. If the recovery is approved, you will get the success screen. Click on Done. 

For Trezor wallet

Having clicked Trezor in the Argent Security Center:

  1. In the Argent Security Center – Enter your Argent username and click Connect
  2. A new tab or window will pop-up (with the URL starting with https://connect.trezor.io) requesting “Read public key permission”. Click Allow.
  3. When asked to export the Ethereum address, click Export.
  4. Enter your Trezor pin.
  5. Check that the address on your device matches the one shown on the screen. If it matches, press Continue. You will be redirected back to the Argent Security Center and then to  https://connect.trezor.io.
  6. Allow requested permissions (“Read public keys” and “Prepare Trezor device for transaction and data signing”).
  7. Sign the message on your device.
  8. In the Argent Security Center - you'll see a set of emojis on the screen. Click Accept if the emojis match those you see in your wallet. You will be redirected to the https://connect.trezor.io popup/window.
  9. Allow requested permissions once again (“Read public keys” and “Prepare Trezor device for transaction and data signing”).
  10. Sign the message on your device.
  11. If the recovery is approved, you will get the success screen. Click Done.

After guardian approval

You will see the options to pay network fee for the recovery. The network fee is shown according to the current gas prices and might vary. 

You will be able to select one of the assets you have in the wallet that can be used for network fees.

If you don't have enough of the accepted tokens, you can send the needed amount to your wallet from another Ethereum address or top-up the wallet balance using fiat to crypto options available for your location. 

What's with the emojis? 

The emojis enhance the security of the recovery process. The emojis represent a cryptographic hash of the new account address (the public key of the new phone). By checking that you and your guardian see the same emojis you can check: 

  1. That the request is genuine
  2. That nobody has tampered with the public key

For more detail on this, check out this post from one of our engineers. 

Recovering Argent zkSync Lite

zkSync Lite account is not a smart contract, the address is the same as your Argent Vault. It is recovered automatically upon Vault recovery, however you will need to claim your zkSync Lite address after the Vault recovery is complete. 

Recovering Starknet mobile

At the moment Starknet mobile recovery is not available in the app. Please email us to support@argent.xyz from the registered email address so that we could add you to the recovery waitlist. 

Importing Argent X accounts

You can find the guide on importing the Argent X accounts after recovery here. 

 

 

 

 

 

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