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To cut through some of the confusion surrounding bitcoin, we need to divide it into two components. On the one hand, you've got bitcoin-the-token, a snippet of code that represents ownership of an electronic concept kind of like a virtual IOU. On the other hand, you have bitcoin-the-protocol, a dispersed network which maintains a ledger of balances of bitcoin-the-token.
The machine enables payments to be sent between users without passing via a central authority, such as a bank or payment gateway. It's made and kept electronically. Bitcoins arent printed, like dollars or euros theyre made by computers all around the planet, using free software.
It was the very first instance of what we today call cryptocurrencies, a growing asset class which shares some features of traditional currencies, together with verification based on cryptography.
A pseudonymous software programmer going by the name of Satoshi Nakamoto proposed bitcoin in 2008, within an electronic payment method based on mathematical evidence. The idea was to generate a means of exchange, independent of any central authority, that could be transferred electronically in a secure, verifiable and immutable manner.
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Bitcoin can be used to cover things electronically, if the two parties are willing. In that sense, its similar to conventional dollars, euros, or yen, that can also be traded digitally.
Bitcoins most important characteristic is that it is decentralized. No single institution controls the bitcoin network. It's maintained by a group of volunteer coders, and run through an open network of committed computers spread around the globe. This brings individuals and groups who are uncomfortable with the control that banks or government institutions have over their money. .
Bitcoin simplifies the double spending issue of electronic currencies (in which electronic assets can easily be replicated and re-used) via an ingenious combination of cryptography and economic incentives. In electronic fiat currencies, this function is fulfilled by banks, which gives them control over the traditional system. With bitcoin, the integrity of these transactions is maintained by a distributed and open network, owned by no-one. .
Fiat currencies (dollars, euros, yen, etc.) have an unlimited supply central banks can issue as many as they want, and can try to manipulate a currencys value relative to others. Holders of this currency (and notably citizens with little alternative) keep the cost.
While senders of traditional electronic payments are usually identified (for verification purposes, and to comply with anti-money laundering and other legislation), users of bitcoin in theory operate in semi-anonymity. Since there is no central validator, users do not need to identify themselves when sending bitcoin to another user. When a transaction request is filed, the protocol checks all previous transactions to confirm that the sender gets the necessary bitcoin in addition to the ability to send them.
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In practice, every user is identified by the address of their pocket. Transactions can, with a little effort, be monitored this way. Also, law enforcement has developed approaches to identify users if necessary.
Furthermore, most exchanges are required by law to perform identity checks on their customers before they are permitted to purchase or sell bitcoin, facilitating another manner that bitcoin utilization can be monitored. Since the network is transparent, the progress of a particular transaction is visible to all.
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This is because there's no central adjudicator that can say okay, return the money. When a transaction is recorded on the network, and if more than an hour has passed, then it's impossible to modify.
Even though this might disquiet a few, it will mean that any transaction on the bitcoin network cannot be tampered with.
The smallest unit of a bitcoin is called a satoshi. It is one hundred millionth of a bitcoin (0.00000001) at todays prices, about one hundredth of a cent. This could conceivably enable microtransactions that traditional electronic money cannot.
Read to find out how bitcoin transactions are processed and how bitcoins are mined, what it can be utilized for, in addition to how you can purchase, sell and store your bitcoin. We also explain a few alternatives to bitcoin, as well as the way its underlying technology the blockchain works. .
If you want to know what is Bitcoin, the way you can get it and how it can help you, without floundering into technical details, this guide is for you. It'll explain how the system works, how you can use it to your gain, which scams to avoid. It will also direct you to resources that will enable you to store and use your very first parts of digital currency.