Bitcoin Watchtower: Instant Alerts When Your Coins Move
The Bitzo Watchtower is watch-only monitoring of the Bitcoin addresses you choose, run from Bitzo's own Bitcoin node. If coins ever leave a wallet you're watching, you get an email straight away — often before the transaction has confirmed — giving you the earliest possible warning of theft, mistakes, or unexpected activity. No keys, no custody, ever.
How the Watchtower works
- Choose the addresses to watch. Pick the public addresses of the wallets documented in your plan — cold storage, a hardware wallet, an inheritance vault. Public addresses only: never a seed phrase, never a private key.
- Our Bitcoin node watches the chain. Bitzo runs its own node and checks every new block — and the mempool, the network's waiting room — for any transaction touching your addresses. No third-party APIs involved.
- You're alerted the moment coins move. An outgoing movement triggers an urgent email immediately, typically before the transaction confirms. If it was you, ignore it. If it wasn't, you have the earliest possible warning to act.
What you get
- The tripwire: urgent outgoing-movement alerts, detected at mempool level, with plain-English next steps.
- Incoming payment receipts: optional confirmations that transfers to cold storage landed where they should.
- A live portal view: what's watched, every movement seen, and a simple quiet-coins status.
- Monitoring that watches itself: heartbeat checks alert our team if monitoring is ever degraded — no silent gaps.
Watch-only by design
The Watchtower reads public blockchain data for addresses you enrol with explicit consent. It never touches seed phrases, private keys, PINs, or passwords — and being watch-only, it cannot move funds. Monitoring starts from the moment you enrol an address; we don't scan its history. You can pause or remove any address at any time, with every change recorded in your audit trail.
Proof, not just a promise
Bitzo runs its own Bitcoin node — we don't rely on third-party block explorers. Our live system status page shows the current block our node has synced to, updated in real time, so you can verify the monitoring service is online and watching. A self-monitoring heartbeat alerts our team the moment anything stalls.
Which plans include the Watchtower
- Continuity Plus (£49/month) — monitoring for up to 3 addresses.
- Private Client (£149/month) — full Watchtower, up to 20 addresses.
- Core Continuity (£19/month) — not included; upgrade at any time.
See pricing for full plan details, or read how Bitzo works end to end. The Watchtower complements — never replaces — the verified human recovery process at the heart of every plan.
Watchtower FAQs
What is the Bitzo Watchtower?
A watch-only monitoring service for Bitcoin addresses you choose. Bitzo's own Bitcoin node watches every block and the mempool, and emails you the moment coins move to or from a monitored address — an early-warning tripwire for theft, mistakes, and unexpected activity.
Can Bitzo see or move my coins?
No. The Watchtower is watch-only. It reads public blockchain data for the addresses you enrol. Bitzo never holds seed phrases or private keys, so it cannot move funds — yours or anyone else's.
How fast are the alerts?
Outgoing movements are detected in the mempool — the network's queue of pending transactions — so the alert email is typically sent before the transaction has confirmed in a block. Incoming payments are confirmed-and-receipted.
Which plans include the Watchtower?
Continuity Plus includes monitoring for up to 3 addresses. Private Client includes up to 20. Core Continuity does not include the Watchtower, but you can upgrade at any time.
Does monitoring cover past transactions?
No — monitoring starts from the moment you enrol an address. We don't scan or store an address's history, which also means enrolment is instant.