bitcoin-dev
BIP Proposal - Address Paste Improvement
Posted on: November 8, 2018 18:00 UTC
There are a few mechanisms available for end users to transfer an address from a web page to the wallet address input field.
These include QR code scanning of a Bitcoin URI, "bitcoin:" URI intent or a BIP70 payment message intent on Android, and similar mechanisms to launch Apps from the browser on desktop OSes. However, these mechanisms work only if the author of the web page has created appropriate links/qr codes as in many cases, addresses are presented as text for users to copy.Users also send addresses through message apps and emails, but applications start to autodetect bitcoin addresses and convert them to bitcoin: links, which may reduce the need for copy-pasting. However, this feature may not be quickly adopted by applications. For well-known entities, the BIP70 payment protocol with authentication via certificates can be used. Still, it does not work for the "the person in front of you is the only trust anchor you have" use case. There are also BIP75 and BIP47 that may help, but the number of wallets that support these protocols is small. This may be due in part to the relative complexity of these protocols.