Art by: Jing Jin
Mycelium, the creators of Mycelium Entropy, the USB paper wallet generator that funded on IndieGoGo has released the long awaited 2.0 version of its popular Android mobile wallet.
Mycelium's mobile app was already popular for its local exchange finder (think localbitcoin.com in your wallet app) but the new version brings a host of privacy and usability features.
New addresses are now created for each transaction, increasing privacy and making blockchain tracking much more difficult. Change will also be sent to a new address after each transaction with the exception of cold storage spending (another killer feature of Mycelium). When spending Bitcoin from an offline wallet, the change will be returned to the same address.
A few other new features: Transactions can now be done offline and broadcast later, transactions can be labeled, and an unlimited number of watch-only addresses are supported. Mycelium is also now BIP32, BIP44 compliant, meaning that multiple addresses are generated from a single "master" seed rather than randomly. BIP39 HD (Hierarchical Deterministic) backups are also supported, allowing master seeds to be backed up using using a mnemonic sentence.
The last feature would have been useful for James Bang, who was accepting donations on behalf of the Hong Kong protesters before having his phone stolen. If Bang, who was using Mycelium but not this newest version, had access to these new features he would have been able to easily recover his funds using the mnemonic sentence and master seed.
All of Mycelium's previous features return, including the ability to monitor mining profits.
Mycelium 2.0 is 100 % compatible with the service's old wallets and accounts. Currently the service is free, with Mycelium taking a 0.2 % fee on trades done through its local trade app. They have stated that this amount is negligible and ask that anyone wishing to support the project buy other Mycelium products, like their USB paper wallet generator that plugs directly into printers.
The Mycelium Bitcoin Wallet is available on their website and Google Play. The Google Play release is staggered (as is common with apps) however, the site has the direct download for the 2.0 app. Still no word on an iOS version, the developers previously stated that they have no current plans to port the app to iOS.