Who created bitcoin and why. Who, when and why invented bitcoin - the history of the creation of cryptocurrency from the very beginning: the most famous versions

A few years ago, few people could have imagined that a revolution could be made in the financial field. Everything was familiar and stable, people used ordinary money, virtual bank transfers appeared, and so on. But this did not suit everyone. This was the impetus for the development of new technology- blockchain. And the product - bitcoin - has become a real breakthrough in the virtual field. True, there are no less passions around the creator of the blockchain than around the technology itself. The fact is that even now it is not known for certain who invented bitcoin.

This is strange, because bitcoin technology is truly revolutionary, and the person or group of people who developed it all could become world heroes, whose names are written in textbooks. In principle, they have already earned this privilege. Of course, at first, bitcoins were practically worthless, but now they are quite legal in most countries. Even presidents keep their assets in bitcoins and boldly admit it, and payments through bitcoins are quite common.

The price of the cryptocurrency in question is constantly growing. Nevertheless, the name of the author of bitcoin until now is practically unknown to anyone. So let's try to figure out who should say "thank you" for the revolutionary development of bitcoin, which saw the world in 2009. And there is something to demonstrate gratitude for, since the bitcoin exchange rate and its popularity in the world is constantly growing. For example, in recent years, operations with bitcoins on the Forex exchange have become incredibly profitable, which is what traders use. Not to mention ordinary users who could not get past the cryptocurrency that has received such success. So a detailed study of cryptocurrency has a rational link - many would like to repeat its success, however, so far no one has succeeded.

Who created bitcoin

To be honest, the answer to the question of who invented the Bitcoin cryptocurrency has been a mystery for almost a decade. There are many theories about this. Each of them has the right to life, but still I wanted to figure out who is the inventor of bitcoin. However, there is only one famous name in the world that can be attributed to the founder of Bitcoin. The author of the cryptocurrency is called Satoshi Nakamoto.

But is he a real person, or is it some kind of pseudonym? No one knows this, and if they do, they are apparently not eager to share this information with anyone. So everything around the name of one of the most brilliant people (or groups) continues to be classified as "top secret". What is there to say if it is not known whether he is Japanese, although the name or pseudonym says exactly this. But isn't this just skillful profanity?

In principle, one thing is known about him - he completed work on the bitcoin network at the end of 2010, and until that moment, improvements were still being made. In principle, apparently, they were needed, because now the network is very convenient and already works independently, more precisely, using decentralized work. In addition, you can be sure that the inventor is now quite rich, since the one who invented bitcoin made a significant profit in the first months of the existence of the cryptocurrency. So now it is quite possible to look for this person in the list of the richest people on the planet. But the fact that he does not belong to public figures is a fact.

Satoshi Nakamoto is the pseudonym of the creator of Bitcoin.

Whenever we ask who is the creator of bitcoin, many answer that it is Satoshi Nakamoto. But who is he really, because there are many blank spots in the definition of Satoshi Nakamoto as the creator of bitcoin. In fact, this person is the creator of cryptocurrency as a phenomenon, because it was he who managed to carry out the third financial revolution, creating fundamentally different money. Therefore, it is not surprising that this person is most likely rich.

He is not only the creator, but also the owner of the cryptocurrency code, and performed the following actions:

In fact, he worked along with the rest of the people in the community, but almost never revealed his identity, much less personal information. True, as already mentioned, he supported the cryptocurrency project exclusively on early stages its development, that is, no longer than two years. The last official entry from him to the community was dated the spring of 2011, where he indicated that he was leaving the development and would be engaged in activities in another area.

What provoked such a decision is not clear, because the system began to work and became more popular every day. Perhaps he was forced to change his area of ​​interest? Let's break down the most popular questions related to Satoshi:

Let's move on to the last name. The first part of the surname "Naka" can be interpreted as "internal environment" or "relationship". "Moto" means "foundation". And again, there is an ambiguity in the surname. So it is difficult to say whether the creator of the cryptocurrency was Japanese. But what a man was good at Japanese- this is a fact (there are too many ambiguities). In addition, the Japanese are known for their incredible flair for technology. In this country, robots are as normal as ordinary people, so the implementation of the idea of ​​​​cryptocurrency could well have occurred to some Japanese. True, no one knows whether it was "he", "she" or "they". Finding out who the creator of bitcoins is, one cannot rule out any options.

In general, the secret remains a secret, but it’s even more interesting to develop bitcoin this way.

Who actually founded bitcoin - the most famous versions

Despite the fact that the creator of bitcoin has long been in the shadows, this does not prevent him from continuing his search, turning this action into real detective investigations with a cryptocurrency bias. Over time, these investigations yielded results, only they turned out to be radically different. That is, the identity of Satoshi Nakamoto was received by several people at once.

Each of them may well turn out to be the creator of the cryptocurrency, but this still needs to be proven. So let's look at the most popular theories of who created not just a new currency, but a fundamentally new financial system:

1. Version(s) number one by Joshua Davis of The New Yorker. According to his investigations, it turned out that Satoshi Nakamoto is Michael Clair. Now a little about Michael. So, he is a cryptography graduate of Trinity College Dublin. And to draw a similar conclusion, Davis was helped by an analysis of more than 80,000 words of Satoshi Nakamoto's online records.

The second suspect is Willy Lehdonvirt. He is a sociologist for the Finnish economic organization. In principle, this theory also takes place, since Vili was a developer in the past computer games. True, both “suspects” say that they have never participated in projects related to cryptocurrencies, and even more so they are not their creators.

1. Version number two by Adam Penenberg. He used Nakamoto's key original phrases on Google to find what other documents used them. Such a coincidence really surfaced in the patent application of three people at once: Neil King, Vladimir Oksman and Charles Bria.

The Bitcoin.org domain name, originally Satoshi, used the same notation. The application was submitted in Finland, and the recording appeared exactly three days later. But only the domain bitcoin.org received registration through the Japanese Patent Registration Service, using the conditions of complete anonymity. And registration to Finland was transferred only in May 2011. So Penenberg's theory is weak. In addition, her infidelity is confirmed by everyone he pointed to.

Right now, every idea of ​​Satoshi's alleged identity is being scrutinized. But apparently, a talented person is talented in everything. So Satoshi Nakamogo, whoever he was, managed to skillfully cover his tracks. So after 8 years, during which the Bitcoin network has existed, no one has been able to figure out who its founder is.

Interestingly, one of latest versions about the creator of the cryptocurrency was the version of the Israeli scientists Dorit Ron and Adi Shamir from the Weizmann Institute. They established a connection between Satoshi and SilkRoad, an online shop that sells drugs and other illegal goods. True, as it turned out later, this was an erroneous statement, and there is no connection.

Why hide – is the mafia or the government behind it?

The excessive mystery surrounding the personality of Satoshi Nakamoto intrigues many. In fact, this is a cause for concern, because the one who created Bitcoin could be anyone. For example, the developers may be some kind of criminal organization that will rob gullible people in this way. Or the government trying to find new levers of influence on the people. In any of these cases, pleasant is not enough.

But why hides the identity of the one who created bitcoins? He really has reasons, because according to the most conservative estimates, he has about a million bitcoins. This is a huge amount, which every year, according to forecasts, will only grow. Let's figure out who is hiding under the guise of the creator of bitcoins and the progenitor of cryptocurrency.

But when talking about bitcoin, the word “mafia” takes on a completely different meaning. Here it refers to an informal association of founders, owners and employees of the electronic payment system PayPal. It is the forerunner of bitcoin, and sold more than 15 years ago, it became the beginning of the emergence of a whole network of companies, without which it is difficult to imagine the modern world: TeslaMotors, YouTube, Yammer, LinkedIn, Yelp, PayPal, Palantir, SpaceX. It is they who form the mafia of the modern real and virtual world.

Who is currently developing Bitcoin

The peculiarity of blockchain technology is that it is independent, peer-to-peer. That is, the creator of the bitcoin cryptocurrency, who is developing the coin and the network, thought out the system in such a way that it did not have to be changed. The system works by itself, but each participant can perform any allowed operations in it.

It makes no sense to engage in the development of bitcoin, since all work is more focused on the blockchain chain. Bitcoin is a spin-off of this system. Notable names who have worked on blockchain and bitcoin include system developer Jeff Garzik and others. In addition, the popularity of bitcoin is added by the fact that the coin is growing in price, and it is becoming more and more difficult to mine it. Now many companies are engaged in this, the main activity of which is working with virtual coins.

In addition, entire countries are interested in the development of the blockchain and bitcoin system. More and more states recognize this cryptocurrency as real and officially allow it to be used in financial transactions. This fact also has a positive effect on the general hype around the cryptocurrency.

Mine bitcoins ordinary users It has been impossible for a long time, but professional farms are doing this. But the amount of bitcoin cryptocurrency is limited, and the more it has already been mined, the more difficult it will be in the future. But do not be sad, because, as already mentioned, in this scheme the main thing is not the financial component, but a fundamentally new way to transfer data.

It is alarming that other cryptocurrencies have leaders, but Bitcoin does not, because Nakamoto has retired. Each member of the network pulls the blanket over himself. In addition, no one knows what the future holds for bitcoin. It can be both very expensive and fall in price to a minuscule, for example, when it becomes so difficult to mine coins that only giant companies can cope with this task, and that’s not a fact.

After Nakamoto, further development is organized and coordinated within the developer community. But there is a condition that any significant changes in the protocol require the consent of the majority of owners of mining pools. In particular, the block structure of the blockchain has changed quite recently (August 1, 2017). Developers and miners have launched a fork of "Bitcoin". He received the name "".

This cryptocurrency is not something fundamentally new and has a common history with bitcoin. True, after August 1, it became an independent cryptocurrency, separating from bitcoin.

History of Bitcoin

Before blockchain technology was created and gossip began about who created it, there was a long period of developments and developments in this industry. If we consider each stage of the formation of a cryptocurrency, this is a very long time, so we will talk about what exactly became the catalyst for the development of the technology in question.

In particular, Marc Andreessen correctly noted that the foundation for the blockchain system, and therefore Bitcoin, was 20 years of research in the field and 40 years of experience in cryptography, where more than a thousand studies were conducted around the world. If we consider this process thesis, we can highlight several particularly important works:

• The first e-cash protocol by David Chaum and Stefan Brands, which the world first heard about in 1983;
• Hashcash by Adam Buck, which was launched in May 1997 to counter spam and DoS attacks. This system is based on proof of work. It has become a component in the implementation of blocks in the bitcoin database;
• The first idea of ​​the b-money cryptocurrency was described in 1998 by Wei Dai. And almost at the same time, independently of Daiya, approximately the same mechanism was described by Nick Szabo. But Nick Szabo also proposed a model of the Bitgold market mechanism, designed to manage inflation in a decentralized system;
• Hal Finney implemented a chain of hash blocks used in the Hashcash system. By the way, it is interesting that it was Hal Finney who became the second member of the Bitcoin network;
• 10 years before bitcoin was born, the benefits of creating an uncontrolled cryptocurrency were described in his novel by Neil Town Stevenson.

Without these discoveries and developments, created long before the one who created Bitcoin launched his blockchain system, it is doubtful that his project would have been successful. However, after bitcoin, there have been many attempts to create a cryptocurrency, but only a couple of them were able to even come close to bitcoin. But none is worth as much as bitcoin.

Start

To start the system, the founder of the cryptocurrency took a bold step - at the end of October 2008, on email addresses subscribers of the resource gmane.comp.encryption.general received a message with the name of the sender "Satoshi Nakamoto". This was exactly the first letter that became the basis for the launch of the very first and most popular cryptocurrency in the world and the blockchain system.

This letter contained descriptions of the properties and essence of the bitcoin cryptocurrency. Subscribers received clarifications that:

• The new cryptocurrency is fully protected from fraud;
• It does not depend on the actions of any organizations;
• The system provides an opportunity to use it anonymously to its owners.

In addition to that, as in this message, exactly the same data was posted on official page bitcoin.org. The only thing that interested people who invented the cryptocurrency. The name Satoshi Nakamoto is most likely a pseudonym. According to him, work on bitcoin and the blockchain system began in 2007, and in 2009 the development of the protocol was completed, and Nakamoto published the program code. At this stage, the formation of the system is over.

First deals

The official creation date for bitcoins is January 3, 2009. It was on this day that the first block with fifty bitcoins was generated. This was the start of something bigger. But the first transfer did not happen immediately, but after a few days. In particular, in January 2009. It was made by Satoshi Nakamoto by sending ten bitcoins to Hal Finney.

As for the first exchange of Satoshi for fiat money, it took place in September 2009. This transaction was carried out by Marty Malmi, who sent 5050 bitcoins to the NewLibertyStandard user. The funny thing is that for this cryptocurrency he received as much as five dollars on PayPal. Malmi must be regretting his hasty decision now. Although even when the first bitcoin exchange was opened, the cryptocurrency did not grow much in price.

But the exchange of bitcoins for real goods took place only in May 2010, when the American Laszlo Hanech bought two . Although a small consolation is the fact that the pizza was delivered.

By the end of 2009, the bitcoin exchange rate was in the range of 700-1600 units per dollar. The course could be viewed at NewLibertyStandard, although the language does not turn to call it exact. As a calculator, they took the average power of a computer processor, multiplied it by the cost of electricity in the United States and divided it into bitcoins, which were generated by the creator of the site. Real money was received in exchange for bitcoins in 2011, when the MtGox exchange appeared.

Rapid takeoff

The ups and downs of bitcoin are a common occurrence that shows that this cryptocurrency has come a thorny path to today's success. But now bitcoin is worth over ten thousand dollars:

Reasons for the Rapid Success of Cryptocurrency

Perhaps the creator of the cryptocurrency did not even count on such a success of his offspring, or maybe he did, and therefore saved a decent amount of bitcoins for himself. Since this is so far the only case of creating a cryptocurrency that has been able to grow so much. But this is not surprising, because by this moment bitcoin had been going on for a long time and made a strong jump in price only this year, breaking all previous records.

The one who invented the cryptocurrency ensured its success from the very beginning by inventing original scheme of work, ensured its performance and ensured that before it was launched, customers were provided with information on how it functions. But the reasons for the rapid success of cryptocurrency are as follows:

• The system is completely anonymous. That is, users should not transfer their personal data to third parties, thereby ensuring their own security;
• Transparency. When conducting a transaction, the recipient has the opportunity to trace the entire chain of transactions. This information is in the archive database forever, so you can confirm the transaction at any time;
• Decentralization. A feature of bitcoins is the independence of their system. It has no owner or administration, and operations to change anything in the system are performed only if there is the consent of the majority of participants.

It has been possible to buy money only since the appearance of stock exchanges. But the alternative to buying is mining. At the very beginning, money was obtained only by mining them. Until 2012, this process was quite simple, but then it became almost impossible to mine bitcoins by mining on a regular computer. Today, it is generally impossible to mine bitcoins at home. This cryptocurrency has become so difficult to mine that it could only be done with equipment with high computing power. Now most miners are large corporations, not ordinary users.

What is backed by Bitcoin?

If we figured out a little about who owns bitcoin as a network (bitcoin does not belong to anyone), then what it is provided with remains incomprehensible to many. So, bitcoin is not backed by anything in the real world. In fact, this cryptocurrency has no real value. The bitcoin exchange rate is not supported by either the bank, or the issuing fund, or anyone else. This is a standalone system.

The question arises, how is the cryptocurrency system controlled if it has nothing under it? Interest and demand are the basis for the growth of the Bitcoin exchange rate. The creator of the cryptocurrency initially envisaged that he would not back it up with any assets, because it has other properties that are not the same as those of a bank.

The peculiarity of bitcoin as a cryptocurrency is that its value only increases over time, since the cost of creating a new cryptocurrency is more than the cost of the previous one. And the system itself was developed in order to conduct secure and anonymous transactions on the network, so even the shadow owners of this cryptocurrency are absent.

In Russia, Satoshi Nakamoto (the one who invented bitcoin) is also famous. But few people here mined bitcoins, and when the cryptocurrency became popular, users became more active. So now bitcoins are popular here as well. At least a hundred transactions involving bitcoins are carried out in the world every minute.

Who Invented Bitcoin? December 1st, 2017

Once again, the forecast for profitability in cloud mining. Who else signed up Hashflare cloud mining? Does anyone have a hashrate of 10 Th/s? I want to check whether the profitability forecast is exactly twice as high there? I mined in 24 days 0,0176 cue ball and service charge was deducted 0.0044 cue ball from mined. As a result, net income 10 600 rub.

I remind . If the output button is not active (hold) mandatory write to support- very often unlocking occurs in manual mode(Maybe they don't want to miss the moment of wholesale withdrawal). Who has already deduced something from the mined one?

After a recent jump to 11,000 and a fall, the bitcoin rate is still climbing forward a little. And here is why this fall actually happened:

The reason for the next jump in bitcoin was a malfunction in the work of the largest American exchange bitcoins Coinbase and on the trading platforms GDAX, Gemini and Bitstamp.

From the news, it can also be noted that the American exchange NASDAQ plans to launch trading in bitcoin futures. The auction will start in 2018.

In the meantime, a vending machine has been opened in Cyprus where you can buy bitcoins. The creators claim that it is directly connected with the global exchanges that trade cryptocurrencies.

Just the other day, former SpaceX employee Sahil Gupta said that he considers Elon Musk to be the creator of Bitcoin. According to him, Musk is well versed in the C ++ programming language, which was used in the process of creating bitcoin.

So who is officially considered the creator of bitcoin?

The name Satoshi Nakamoto is known to quite a few. But who or what is behind it, no one knows. But it is he who is credited with the creation and distribution of cryptocurrencies. We can also say that in 2010 he moved away from this project, having received his share of the income, and a significant one. There are almost legends about who Satoshi is.

In 2008, a file describing the protocol and the principle of operation was published by a person or group of people under the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. payment system as a peer-to-peer network. According to Satoshi, development began in 2007. In 2009, he completed the development of the protocol and published the client program code.

On January 3, 2009, the first block and the first 50 bitcoins were generated. The first bitcoin transaction occurred on January 12, 2009, when Satoshi Nakamoto sent 10 bitcoins to Hal Finney. The first exchange of bitcoins for national money took place in September 2009 - Martti Malmi sent 5050 bitcoins to a user with the pseudonym NewLibertyStandard, for which he received $ 5.02 to his PayPal account. NewLibertyStandart proposed to use the cost of electricity spent on generation to value bitcoins.

Satoshi Nakamoto's fortune in the system is estimated at approximately 1 million bitcoins, which corresponds to 8.2 billion US dollars. The search for a mythical personality will certainly continue further, because every 12th bitcoin is in the hands of this person or group of people, and if desired, Satoshi can destabilize the currency as quickly as he brought it to the world market.
In order to mine such an amount of bitcoins, Satoshi used specific equipment: while his associates, who connected to Bitcoin in the first months, launched a Bitcoin client on simple PCs, Satoshi apparently operated several dozen PCs simultaneously or an FPGA-designed by him a computer.

And last year, Australian entrepreneur Craig Wright announced that he is the creator of the bitcoin cryptocurrency, Satoshi Nakamoto. Wright presented evidence of his involvement in the creation of bitcoin to three publications - the BBC, The Economist and the London Review of Books, using the same digital signature that was used to sign some of the first bitcoin transactions in history - and these transactions were usually associated with Satoshi Nakamoto himself.

Moreover, the BBC claims that prominent members of the bitcoin community and the cryptocurrency development team have confirmed that Wright is Nakamoto. In a BBC video interview, Wright said: "I was the main element, but I was assisted by others." Wright also posted on his blog last Monday explaining in technical detail how he can prove that Nakamoto is him. Gavin Andersen, scientific director of the Bitcoin Foundation, said he believed Wright's words.

sources

A bubble that will burst in one moment, leaving thousands with nothing, or a revolution in the world electronic payments– the attitude towards cryptocurrencies today is radically different. Cryptocurrencies are heard at every step today, but not everyone fully understands what they mean and how to use them.

What is cryptocurrency - in simple words for dummies

The term was fixed in everyday life after the publication in Forbes magazine in 2011, where the name "cryptocurrency" was mentioned, in English - crypto currency. In other words, it is a digital or electronic currency that is produced on the Internet and stored here on virtual wallets. There is simply no physical analogue of it.

When creating this currency, a special cryptographic cipher is used, consisting of sequential hashing and a digital signature. Hence the first part of the word - crypto.

At first glance, the cryptocurrency is similar to traditional electronic payment systems. However, the differences between them are actually enormous. And the first is the way money is issued and stored, which we will talk about later.

But first, the positives...

As with any concept, there are also advantages and disadvantages. Let's start with the advantages of cryptocurrencies, and among the main ones we note:

• decentralization;
• direct exchange in the absence of intermediaries;
• transparency;
• anonymity;
• small commissions for transfers, or even their absence at all;
• not afraid of inflation;
• ease of use.

Decentralization

When creating a cryptocurrency, there is no centralized body that deals with emissions, that is, issues title units, such as the Fed in the USA, the Central Bank or the National Bank in the Russian Federation or Ukraine, respectively, when it comes to ordinary money. If we take payment systems like WebMoney or Yandex.Money, they also belong to certain organizations and are controlled by them.

In the situation with cryptocurrencies such central regulator no. They are based on a system - in other words, a distributed database. Depending on the popularity of a particular cryptocurrency, it is stored simultaneously on thousands or even millions of computers around the world at the same time.

A few words where does the cryptocurrency come from

A cryptocurrency is created using mathematical calculations and is a computer-generated code. In most cases, the process looks like this.

Users send transactions to each other, which are collected in blocks sequentially linked to each other, and thus confirmed. With each found block, a certain number of crypto coins are released, which are received by the one who confirmed the block.

Cryptocurrency is created using mathematical calculations and is a computer-generated code. It is issued in blocks linked by sequential hashing.

Such a process is called, and those who do this are called miners. Thus, this currency is issued and stored decentralized.

Figuratively speaking, anyone can build a mint at home and turn on the printing press, subject to certain conditions. Enough to have powerful computer and install the appropriate program on it.

By analogy with the gold rush that hit humanity in the 19th century, today the world has been swept by a cryptocurrency fever. Entire mining farms are being created that tirelessly generate new and new coins (coins).

But that's not all. With a strong desire to create and put into circulation, you can also have your own personal cryptocurrency. If it inspires confidence among users, success is guaranteed.

By the way, it is worth noting that in some cryptocurrencies, all tokens are issued at the start of the system, and are not mined gradually over time. These include, for example, Ripple, Cardano, Stellar and others.

And through classical mining, coins are mined from such currencies:

• bitcoin;
• Ethereum;
• Litecoin;
• Monero
• Dash.

No intermediaries

As a rule, we exchange money (we are not talking about cash in this case) through intermediaries. These can be banks, payment systems, exchangers. All of them establish their own exchange rules, which can be changed at any time. In any incomprehensible situations, your accounts may be blocked.

In the case of cryptocurrencies, there are no such intermediaries. Here, each user transfers money directly to another user's wallet from anywhere in the world.

Thus, the essence of cryptocurrencies is to eliminate a third party during transactions, that is, intermediaries in the face of banks, exchangers. Another nuance is that such transfers are difficult to track, for example, by the tax authorities. More precisely, all transactions in electronic cash systems are visible to anyone.

It is not a problem to see how much, from which purse and to which what amount was transferred. The question is different - it is not easy to associate these wallets with a specific person. The main goal of this approach is to eliminate fraud in transactions and maintain anonymity.

In the absence of intermediaries, the strictly established commission for transactions also disappears. You can often transfer money, if not for free, then for a small fee.

Another question is that it is more profitable for the miner to process those transfers that provide for a larger reward in the first place. However, compared to the commissions of banks or exchange offices, here you can set the amount as a reward an order of magnitude lower.

What does a cryptocurrency look like

But in fact, no way. There are simply no physical analogues. It is impossible to physically transfer cryptocurrency from hand to hand. In fact, these are only records of completed transactions. Let's say Vasya transferred 2 bitcoins to Gosha - it will look like a record in the blockchain about the transaction. And Gosha will have these 2 bitcoins on his wallet balance until he transfers them to someone else.

Cryptocurrency mining algorithms

As already mentioned, all transactions in cryptocurrency systems are encrypted in a special way. For this, different algorithms are used. For Bitcoin, this is, for example, SHA-256, for Litecoin it is Scrypt. Their transactions are confirmed using PoW (Proof-Of-Work, proof of work). Novacoin uses (PoS, proof of storage) in addition to PoW. Other cryptocurrencies like NXT only use PoS.

Of the other hashing algorithms, it is worth mentioning X11, X13, X15, N-Scrypt, CryptoNote, each with its own pluses and minuses.

How to get cryptocurrency

In addition to the mining mentioned above, when miners receive a commission for generating electronic currencies, you can get hold of coins either by accepting them as payment for goods or services, or for cash on specialized cryptocurrency exchanges. Among the popular:

• Bitfinex;
• bithumb;
• Kraken;
• Bittrex;
• exmo;
• Poloniex.

You can also purchase digital coins using exchange offices that will gladly exchange dollars, euros, rubles or hryvnias for popular cryptocurrencies.

There are also so-called cryptocurrency faucets that distribute tokens for free for performing certain actions - viewing ads, solving captchas. However, you can get a very meager amount of coins with their help.

How to store cryptocurrency

For this, there are special cryptocurrency wallets. They are of various types:

• As a program for installation on a computer - in this case, your coins are stored on your hard drive.
• As an application for mobile devices.
• Online wallets that can be accessed through a browser. For example, blockchain.info.
• Hardware wallets in the form of a physical medium, similar to a regular USB flash drive.

If you buy coins on the exchange, you can keep them directly on the balance of this site.

How without cons?

If there are advantages, then there are disadvantages. In the case of electronic cash, it is important to be careful about the safety of the wallet, as well as the password to it. If access is lost, you can say goodbye to money forever. It is unlikely to be restored.

It is also worth considering the irreversibility of transactions. If you mistakenly transferred money to the wrong wallet, you can return it only with the voluntary consent of its owner.

Among the minuses, it is also worth mentioning the ambiguous attitude of different states towards the existence of cryptocurrencies. Some consider them as a means of payment, for example, Japan, others either limit their turnover or completely prohibit any work with them.

What is cryptocurrency for?

Cryptocurrencies are a kind of symbol of freedom. Lack of control, transfers directly to each other - such opportunities attract many.

Therefore, given the growing popularity of virtual money, more and more shops in the world are beginning to accept them as payment. Also, cryptocurrencies are increasingly used as an investment tool. However, given their increased volatility, this should be done carefully.

What are the cryptocurrencies - how it all began and what we have

The first and currently the most expensive cryptocurrency was released in 2009 and it is called bitcoin. It was invented by an anonymous person or a group of people hiding under the name of Satoshi Nakamoto. It is with it that the very concept of cryptocurrency is most often associated.

Since that time, a great many different electronic currencies have appeared with original and not very concepts, most often tailored to a specific industry. For example, IOTA for the Internet of Things.

Their number has already successfully exceeded one thousand. Most of them duplicate each other, differing only in names.

The developers are doing their best to outdo each other. This is how cryptocurrencies appear for owners of Facebook accounts (Face), the LGBT community (GayCoin). Others are dedicated to famous people and contain their names in their names - EinsteinCoin, TeslaCoin.

In March 2018, the top 10 cryptocurrencies are as follows:

1. bitcoin;
2. Ethereum;
3. Ripple
4. Bitcoin Cash
5. Litecoin;
6. Cardano;
7. Stellar
8. Monero.

Most often, new cryptocurrencies are issued for specific tasks. If bitcoin was developed exclusively for transactions and is often called virtual gold, then, for example, Ethereum is intended not only for money transfers, it already contains smart contracts. Also, decentralized applications are launched on the basis of its network. By the way, the role of an analogue of silver in the world of cryptocurrencies is assigned to Litecoin.

What is the backing of cryptocurrencies

It is worth noting that digital currencies are not backed by anything: neither gold and foreign exchange reserves, nor the economy of a particular state. The only thing that determines their value is demand. The higher it is, the more expensive you have to pay for a certain currency unit. In addition, the creators of certain cryptocurrencies most often set the emission volume in advance, upon reaching which the coins will no longer be issued. For example, Bitcoin has 21 million coins.

Capitalization, price and ratings

You can see the list of the most popular cryptocurrencies on specialized sites. An example is coinmarketcap.com. Here, in the form of a table, the top most common cryptocurrencies are shown, their price, market capitalization, price chart and other indicators.

Also on our website we have our own, where you can find out their current value in relation to the dollar, ruble, hryvnia, view charts.

By the way, in December 2017, the total capitalization of cryptocurrencies exceeded $500 billion. And in January 2018, it completely exceeded the figure of 800 billion. In March, this figure has already dropped to 360 billion. Bitcoin is also leading with a figure of $150 billion.

To find out the rates of a particular currency, you should use one of the currency converters presented on the network. For example, en.cryptonator.com

Legal regulation of cryptocurrency

Different countries today have different attitudes towards cryptocurrencies. Japan officially recognized bitcoin as legal tender in the spring of 2017 and exempted it from consumption tax when sold. More recently, it began to be treated as a unit of account in Germany as well.

Favorable attitude towards cryptocurrencies in Switzerland. In the US and Canada, they are treated as valuable property, and in Bulgaria they are treated as a financial asset. The UK views digital money as a foreign currency. Iceland forbids its citizens to buy tokens on exchanges, but mining, on the contrary, welcomes it.

Cryptocurrency banned in Russia? - Not. While officials are pondering the age-old question “to be or not to be”, everyone here conducts operations with crypto-tokens at their own peril and risk.

Russia is going to adopt an appropriate law on cryptocurrencies this year. In January, the Ministry of Finance published the preliminary text of the bill, according to which mining will be classified as an entrepreneurial activity, and cryptocurrencies will not be able to be legal tender.

In the so-called "gray zone" there is a cryptocurrency at the present time in Ukraine. Back in 2017, 3 bills were submitted to the Verkhovna Rada to regulate this area, but so far none of them has been adopted.

What will happen to cryptocurrencies in 2018

What will happen? – Further growth and development. This snowball is unlikely to be stopped by anyone. Some cryptocurrencies can sink into oblivion, others will come to replace them. The top 10 cryptocurrencies may change - stronger systems will push those who have stopped in their development. However, digital money will no longer be able to disappear from our lives. Even if some states ban them. In general, today we are talking more about the regulation of cryptocurrencies, and in 2018 active steps will continue to be taken in this direction.

What is bitcoin backed by?

Unlike conventional Money bitcoin is not backed by absolutely any material values. In addition, neither banks nor the emission fund are engaged in supporting the cryptocurrency exchange rate. How, then, to trust this virtual currency, if the owner completely lacks any financial guarantees?

The fact is that the one who invented the cryptocurrency was not at all going to back it up with gold or shares. This payment system has completely different properties. As a result, pricing in it is completely dependent on the real supply and demand for bitcoin. This is hard to believe for ordinary people who are faced with various financial pyramid schemes. But, the fact is that bitcoin is created in such a way that its value will only increase over time. This is because the cost of creating each new coin exceeds the cost of the previous one.

Who invented bitcoin and why, if there is no depositor protection system, and the value of virtual coins is not protected by anything? The matter is that in comparison with other systems. Bitcoin was developed as an independent decentralized system for anonymous transactions. In addition, this currency has no "shadow" owners. Most likely, its stability is not able to affect either government bodies or large corporations.

Bitcoin: why is it serious?

The following facts can convince users that bitcoin is a serious project, and not just another pyramid scheme:

• bitcoin has the highest degree of protection against falsification (it is almost impossible to generate keys or forge existing ones);
• each has a complex security system consisting of at least 6 confirmations;
• impossible without expensive computer equipment;
• the number of goods and services that can be bought by paying for them with bitcoins is constantly increasing;
• changes in the protocol of the system are possible only if there is the consent of 90% of the community members.

Interesting to know! Every minute there are at least 100 transactions involving bitcoin in the world. This is a convincing proof of the prospects of the cryptocurrency.

Who is he, a brilliant inventor named Satoshi Nakamoto?

To this day, the question remains: who invented bitcoin? Although the history of the creation of the new cryptocurrency bitcoin refers to Satoshi Nakamoto. Is he Japanese by name? Or, nevertheless, is this the conditional name of a group of people involved in the creation of bitcoin, and who wished to remain anonymous?

Analysis of the name Satoshi Nakamoto in the history of bitcoin

The analysis of the name of the one who invented bitcoin is very interesting. If translated from Japanese "Satoshi", then literally it will sound like: "wise", "resourceful" or "clear thinking". The beginning of the surname "Naka" in Russian means: "relationships" or "internal environment". And also the second part of "Moto" is translated as "foundation" or "origin". Isn't it a very appropriate name for the creator of a radically new, cunning financial algorithm?

No one succeeded in revealing the secret of who this great inventor, hiding under the name of Satoshi Nakamoto, really is. As a result, the only certainty known about who created bitcoin is that this person has a very outside-the-box thinking. This is confirmed by Jeff Garzik, one of the main developers of the system. He claims that:

The principle of writing the code of a brilliant inventor of cryptocurrency does not fit into the level of intelligence of a typical software engineer.

In addition, they say that Satoshi Nakamoto is a very wealthy person. After all, at the end of 2013, he owned the amount of bitcoin, which in terms of dollars is 1 billion.

Now this person has retired from business related to the bitcoin system. He announced this himself in 2011. But, he is confident that his brainchild, bitcoin, is in the safe hands of a team of professionals led by Gavin.

The history of bitcoin is unusual. It is shrouded in a haze of mystery hovering around the name of the main creator. But, the fact remains: the ingenious invention works, and the new cryptocurrency is becoming more and more popular every day.

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Cryptocurrency is a digital currency protected by cryptographic technologies. These monetary units have no physical analogue, they exist only in the virtual space.

The term "cryptocurrency" came into use after the publication of an article talking about bitcoin - a digital currency and a payment system. Bitcoin is the brainchild of Satoshi Nakamoto, but what kind of person or group of people is behind this pseudonym is still not known for certain. Nakamoto presented the concept of a decentralized payment system on October 31, 2008. Its main principles are anonymity for all participants, fraud protection and independence from regulatory organizations.

The bitcoin network is made up of interconnected blocks of transactions. Each subsequent block contains information about the previous one, so you can build them into a single chain and get information about all transactions made earlier (but not about the owners of bitcoins). The process of creating new blocks is called mining. In order for the next block to appear on the network, it is necessary to generate a cryptographic signature for it. As a reward, you get new bitcoins. By the way, their emission is not an endless process. It is known in advance that no more than 21 million bitcoins can be created in total.

Initially, it was relatively easy to create blocks, and single miners could do it too. Over time, the complexity grew, mining required solid computing power, so the miners began to unite in pools and mine new bitcoins by joint efforts.

Great. Can you do it sooner?

To simplify everything as much as possible, then the phenomenon of bitcoins can be explained by the example of lemonade caps (yes, hello Fallout fans). Suppose you can’t fake these caps, go shopping and buy all the lemonade too: it’s no longer made. The number of caps is limited and known in advance, so you just have to wander around and look under your feet - suddenly you stumble upon a cap.

Like any finite resource, caps have a certain value that grows as demand increases. The first covers are easy to find, but the farther, the more difficult. People have to unite in groups and spend a fair amount of time and effort to find the next cap. They exchange their prey for all sorts of necessary things, and many even stock caps in the hope that over time their rate will only become higher.

Why is such a currency needed?

Then, why and ordinary money: it is a universal commodity, which is a measure of value when buying and selling other goods.

Cryptocurrency has several significant advantages. First, it is not afraid of inflation. If the printing press goes crazy and churns out a crazy amount of rubles, it is logical that this money will depreciate. With bitcoins, this situation is excluded: remember that their number is known in advance and limited.

Another plus is decentralization. Not single center, from which the system is controlled, which means that it is extremely difficult to disrupt the performance of this system by forcibly limiting the spread of the currency. The network simply does not have a single owner, it is controlled by users around the world.

The next benefit is anonymity. It is possible to track transactions and see how many bitcoins moved from one wallet to another, but determining who exactly owns the wallet is not so easy. Any person can open a bitcoin account, for this you need an appropriate software and access to the web.

Since it's money, you can buy something with it. Or not?

Of course you can. It seems strange that money, which, in fact, does not exist (in any case, we cannot hold it in our hands), has purchasing power, but the fact remains that they can be exchanged for goods and services in the same way as banknotes or coins that are in your wallet. Bitcoins can even be exchanged for other money - euros or dollars - at your discretion. In many countries, people use bitcoins to buy flights and gadgets, use them to pay for utilities or drinks in a pub, even Microsoft accepts bitcoins.

Funny story: in 2013, a user on a bitcoin forum offered to exchange his 10,000 bitcoins for a couple of pizzas. Then the deal was quite profitable, but what this lover of Italian cuisine thinks about such an exchange now, one can only guess.

In Russia, due to problems with determining the legal status of cryptocurrencies, the situation with the exchange of bitcoins for goods or services is more complicated, so first of all it is worth considering bitcoins as an investment option. On the this moment the game is definitely worth the candle: the bitcoin rate is steadily growing. The most profitable investments are associated with the most high level risk, so choose what is more important to you: the opportunity to make good money or complete peace of mind.

How to get a bitcoin wallet?

Go to the official website of the payment system and choose from the list of applications for Android, iOS, Windows, macOS and Linux the option that suits you. The only problem is that such applications can take up too much space, but in this case there is another way.

Can be trusted third party service bitcoin wallets such as Blockchain. The registration process takes a matter of minutes: you just need to enter your email address and come up with enough strong password. In the "Security Center" section, you can link your wallet to a phone number and activate two-step verification to further secure the funds stored in your account.

Where can I find the best exchange rate for cryptocurrencies?

In order not to waste time searching for an exchanger with the most favorable rate, use it - this is a service that has collected information about the current rates of more than 300 exchangers. To independently look for the most profitable in such a heap of proposals is a task for the infinitely patient. With BestChange, in just a couple of clicks, you can determine which exchanger services you should use.

For search the best rate select the currency you have and the one you want to exchange it for. The service provides a list of exchangers that carry out transactions with these types of currencies, you sort them by the rate, compare and select. When it is not possible to exchange currency directly, a double exchange will help out - here a transit currency comes to the rescue.

If the current state of affairs does not suit you, set up alerts. As soon as the rate approaches the mark you are interested in, BestChange will notify you by e-mail or in Telegram. You can study in advance fluctuations in the exchange rate from an hour to a year.

For those who are afraid of running into scammers, reviews of exchange offices will help. Reviews are collected in a separate column, red - negative, green - positive. When you hover over the icon to the left of the name of the exchanger, a window pops up with brief information: length of service, country of origin and amount of reserves.

If you want to profitably buy or sell currency, this is the first service you should turn to. On June 19, it turns 10 years old, over the years BestChange has become, perhaps, the most convenient and thoughtful resource for finding exchange offices. Only proven and reliable exchangers, the ability to monitor the slightest exchange rate fluctuations and a quick search for the most profitable options are a reasonable choice for those who value their time and money.