Btc bitcoin wikipedia

As a new user, you can get started with Bitcoin without understanding the technical details. Once you have installed a Bitcoin wallet on your computer or mobile phone, it will generate your first Bitcoin address and you can create more whenever you need one. You can disclose your addresses to your friends so that they can pay you or vice versa.

In fact, btc bitcoin wikipedia is pretty similar to how email works, except that Bitcoin addresses should only be used once. The block chain is a shared public ledger on which the entire Bitcoin network relies. All confirmed transactions are included in the block chain. This way, Bitcoin wallets can calculate their spendable balance and new transactions can be verified to be spending bitcoins that are actually owned btc bitcoin wikipedia the spender.

The integrity and the chronological order of the block chain are enforced with cryptography. A transaction is a transfer of value between Bitcoin wallets that gets included in the block chain. Bitcoin wallets keep a secret piece of data called a private key or seed, which is used to sign transactions, providing a mathematical proof that they have come from the owner of the wallet. The signature also prevents the transaction from being altered by anybody btc bitcoin wikipedia it btc bitcoin wikipedia been issued.

All transactions are broadcast between users and usually begin to be confirmed by the network in the following 10 minutes, through a process called mining. Mining is a distributed consensus system that is used to confirm waiting transactions by btc bitcoin wikipedia them in the block chain.

Btc bitcoin wikipedia enforces a chronological order in the block chain, protects the neutrality of the network, and allows different computers to agree on the state of the system. To be confirmed, transactions btc bitcoin wikipedia be packed in a block that fits very strict cryptographic rules that will be verified by the network. These rules prevent previous blocks from being modified because doing so would invalidate all following blocks. Mining also creates the equivalent of a competitive lottery that prevents any individual from easily adding new blocks consecutively in the block chain.

This way, no individuals can control what is included in the block chain or replace parts of the block chain to roll back their own spends. This is only a very short and concise summary of the system.

If you want to get into the details, you can read the original paper that describes the system's design, read btc bitcoin wikipedia developer documentationand explore the Bitcoin wiki.

How does Bitcoin work? This is a question that often causes confusion. Here's a quick explanation! The basics for a new user As a new user, you can get started with Bitcoin without understanding the technical details.

Balances - block chain The block btc bitcoin wikipedia is a shared btc bitcoin wikipedia ledger on which the entire Bitcoin network relies. Transactions - private keys A transaction is a transfer of value between Bitcoin wallets that btc bitcoin wikipedia included in the block chain. Processing - mining Mining is a distributed consensus system that is used to confirm waiting transactions by including them in the block chain.

Going down the rabbit hole This is only a very short and concise summary of the system.

The legal status of bitcoin varies substantially from country to country and is still undefined or changing in many of them. While some countries have explicitly allowed its use and trade, others have banned or restricted it.

Likewise, various government agencies, departments, and courts have classified bitcoins differently. While this article provides the legal status of bitcoin, regulations and bans that apply to this cryptocurrency likely extend to similar systems as well.

According to the European Central Banktraditional financial sector regulation is not applicable to btc bitcoin wikipedia because it does not involve traditional financial actors. The European Central Bank classifies bitcoin as a convertible decentralized virtual currency. Btc bitcoin wikipedia the European Parliament's proposal to set up a taskforce to monitor virtual currencies to combat money laundering and terrorism, passed by votes to 51, with 11 abstentions, has been sent to the European Commission for consideration.

As of [update] bitcoin was legal in Algeria, but btc bitcoin wikipedia the Huffington Post"Algeria is going to ban bitcoin in the new Finance law of article of the law " [13]. Virtual currency is that used by internet users via the web.

It is characterized by the absence of physical support such as coins, notes, payments by cheque or credit card. Any breach of this provision is punishable in accordance with the laws and regulations in force.

The following day, the monetary authorities also reacted in a statement issued jointly by the Ministry of Economy and Finance, Bank Al-Maghrib and the Moroccan Capital Market Authority AMMCwarning against risks associated with bitcoin, which may be used "for illicit or criminal purposes, including money laundering and terrorist financing". On 19 DecemberAbdellatif Jouahri, governor of Bank Al-Maghrib, said at a btc bitcoin wikipedia conference held in Rabat during the last quarterly meeting of the Bank Al-Maghrib's Board of that bitcoin is not a currency but a "financial asset", Btc bitcoin wikipedia also warned of its dangers and called for a framework to be put in place for consumer protection.

As of 17 JanuaryThe Central Bank of Nigeria CBN has passed a circular to inform all Nigerian banks that bank transactions in bitcoin and other virtual currencies have been banned in Nigeria.

It noted btc bitcoin wikipedia "Central bank cannot control btc bitcoin wikipedia regulate bitcoin. Central bank cannot control or regulate blockchain. Just the same way no one is going to control or regulate the Internet. In September the Bank of Namibia issued a position paper on Virtual Currencies entitled [23] wherein it declared cryptocurrency exchanges are not allowed and cryptocurrency cannot be accepted as payment for goods and services. The Reserve Bank Of Zimbabwe is sceptical about bitcoin and has not officially permitted its use.

Bitcoin would seem to be classified pursuant to the current provisions of the PPSA simply as an " intangible ". As of April the Bank of Montreal BMO announced that it would ban its credit and debit card customers from participating in cryptocurrency purchases with their btc bitcoin wikipedia [31]. Treasury classified bitcoin as a convertible decentralized virtual currency in Per IRS, bitcoin is taxed as a property. In Septembera federal judge ruled that "Bitcoins are funds within the plain meaning of that term".

Bitcoin is legal in Mexico as of Btc bitcoin wikipedia is to be regulated as a virtual asset by the FinTech Law. News reports indicate that bitcoins are being used in the country. The Costa Rican Central Bank announced that bitcoin and cryptocurrencies are not consider currencies, and are not backed by the government nor laws. However, they are not illegal. There are a few merchants who do accept bitcoins in the country. The Bank of Jamaica BoJthe national Central Bank, has publicly declared that it must btc bitcoin wikipedia opportunities for the exploitation of technologies including cryptocurrencies.

Accordingly, in the BoJ will be embarking on btc bitcoin wikipedia campaign to build awareness of cryptocurrencies as part of increasing general financial literacy and understanding of cryptocurrencies. Indications are that early BoJ signals point to their general framework on "electronic retail payment service systems" possibly being brought to bear on initial cryptocurrencies considerations.

Bitcoins may be considered money, but not legal currency. A bitcoin may be considered either a good or a thing under the Argentina's Civil Code, and transactions with bitcoins may be governed by the rules for the sale of goods under the Civil Code.

The Central Bank of Bolivia issued a resolution banning btc bitcoin wikipedia and any other currency not regulated by a country or economic zone in Not regulated, according to a statement by the Central Bank of Brazil concerning cryptocurrencies, but is discouraged because of operational risks. There is no regulation on the use of bitcoins. A 26 March by Superintendencia Financiera de Colombia states that the use of bitcoin is not regulated.

The Ecuadorian government has issued a ban on bitcoin and other digital currencies. Ecuador's new project would be controlled by the government and tied directly to the local currency—the dollar. Users will be able to pay for select services and send money between individuals. This was slated to begin in mid-February Bitcoin is considered a commodity, [47] not a security or currency under the laws of the Btc bitcoin wikipedia Republic and may be legally mined, bought, sold and traded on a local commodity exchange.

The use of bitcoins is not regulated in Cyprus. As a DMCC licensed company, Regal Assets DMCC operates in a secure regulated trading environment and offers a service to global investors to the highest standards of international compliance.

As ofthe Israel Tax Authorities issued a statement saying that bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies would not fall under the legal definition of currency, and neither of that of a financial security, but of a taxable asset. Bitcoin is not banned by any governmental party in Saudi Arabia. The government of Jordan has issued btc bitcoin wikipedia warning discouraging the use of bitcoin and other similar systems. The Central Bank of Jordan prohibits banks, currency exchanges, financial companies, and payment service companies from dealing in bitcoins or other digital currencies.

The government of Lebanon has issued a warning discouraging the use of bitcoin and other similar systems. Bitcoin is not regulated as it is not considered to be electronic money according to the law. Bitcoin is neither recognized nor regulated in Iran. Government officials, however, discourage investing in cryptocurrencies until after the regulations are made.

In SeptemberBangladesh Bank said that "anybody caught using the virtual currency could be jailed under the country's strict anti-money laundering laws".

Finance minister Arun Jaitley, in his budget speech on 1 Februarystated that the government will do everything to discontinue the use of bitcoin and other virtual currencies in India for criminal uses. He reiterated that India does not recognise them as legal tender and will instead encourage blockchain technology in payment systems. On 13 August Nepal Rastra Bank declared bitcoin as illegal.

This btc bitcoin wikipedia was followed right after India's restriction of converting bitcoin and cryptocurrencies into fiat currency. For organizations and institutions it is banned by State Bank of Pakistan. Bank will not get involved if there is any dispute. They will not facilitate any transaction for it. For individuals, it is neither legal nor illegal and they can hold cryptocurrencies at their own risk. National Assembly of Pakistan can pass law to declare bitcoin legal or illegal in Pakistan, but there is btc bitcoin wikipedia such news from National Assembly yet.

The bank has issued an official notice on its website and has also posted the news on its official Twitter account. While private parties can hold and trade bitcoins in China, regulation prohibits financial firms like banks from doing the same. On 5 DecemberPeople's Bank of China PBOC made its first step in regulating bitcoin by prohibiting financial institutions from handling bitcoin transactions.

On 16 December it was speculated that the PBOC had issued a new ban on third-party payment processors btc bitcoin wikipedia doing business with bitcoin exchanges, [67] however a statement from BTC China suggests this isn't accurate, and rather payment processors had voluntarily withdrawn their services.

On 1 April PBOC ordered commercial banks and payment companies to close bitcoin trading accounts in two weeks. On 9 Februarymultiple bitcoin exchanges in China delayed or paused bitcoin withdraw service, with or without announcement. Some of the announcements, [71] [72] [73] [74] if not all, claim that regulation activities have been or are to be taken. News resources [75] also show that, although such activities were carried out by PBOC, they were not done via legal approaches, but btc bitcoin wikipedia "appointment" instead.

None of the exchanges presented or have claimed to receive any lawful paperwork. The crackdown on bitcoin and other virtual currency traders was accompanied by Chinese media touting the dangers of virtual currency as a tool for btc bitcoin wikipedia activities.

On 8 Januarythe Secretary for Financial Services and the Treasury addressed bitcoin in the Legislative Council stating that "Hong Kong at present has no legislation directly regulating bitcoins and other virtual currencies of [a] similar kind. However, our existing laws such as the Organised and Serious Crimes Ordinance provide sanctions against unlawful acts involving bitcoins, such as fraud or money laundering. He also decided that bitcoins will not be regulated by HKMA. However, the authority will be closely watching the usage of bitcoins locally and its development overseas.

Japan officially recognizes bitcoin and digital currencies as a "means of payment that is not a legal currency" see Article of Japans's Payment Services Act PSA 25 May On 7 Marchthe Japanese government, in response to a series of questions asked in the National Diet, made a cabinet decision on the btc bitcoin wikipedia treatment of bitcoins in the form of answers to the questions. The decision also acknowledges that there are no laws to unconditionally prohibit individuals or legal entities from receiving bitcoins in exchange for goods or services.

Taxes may be applicable to bitcoins. According to Nikkei Asian Reviewin February"Japanese financial regulators have proposed handling virtual currencies as methods of payment equivalent to conventional currencies". The city of Hirosaki is officially accepting bitcoin donations with the goal of attracting international tourists and financing local projects.

While not illegal in the country, Korean authorities will prosecute illegal activity involving bitcoin [88] and have indicted at least one btc bitcoin wikipedia for purchasing drugs with bitcoin. There are no laws in South Korea regulating the use of bitcoin at present. South Korea On 12 Decemberthe president of the Bank of Korea recommended at a press conference that bitcoin be regulated in the future.

Bitcoin ATMs are banned here [7]: Taiwan but bitcoins can be purchased at over convenience store kiosks. Regulators have warned the public that bitcoin does not have legal protection, "as the currency is not issued by any monetary authority and is therefore not entitled to legal claims or btc bitcoin wikipedia of conversion". While bitcoin is not illegal in Taiwan, financial institutions have been warned by regulators that necessary regulatory actions may be taken if they use it.

On 6 DecemberPerng Fai-nan said that bitcoin is only used in certain btc bitcoin wikipedia. Besides, he also opined that the value of bitcoin is a bubble and is highly volatile.

Therefore, he advised the public against the speculation of bitcoins to prevent making a loss during the process. The central bank is closely watching the development of bitcoin btc bitcoin wikipedia plan to impose regulations in the future. It is stated that bitcoins remains highly volatile, highly speculative, and is not entitled to legal claims or guarantee of conversion.

However, despite this, three of the four major convenience store chains in Taiwan make available purchases of bitcoin through their kiosk systems, [97] and the largest btc bitcoin wikipedia now allows bitcoin to be used for purchases btc bitcoin wikipedia goods. There are no regulations related to the use of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in Cambodia.

Btc bitcoin wikipedia National Bank has stated that cryptocurrencies are illegal in Cambodia and has instructed commercial banks in the country not to accept bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies in financial transactions.

Bitcoin was invented by an unknown person or group of people under the name Satoshi Nakamoto [10] and released as open-source software in Bitcoins are created as a reward for a process known as mining. They can be exchanged for other currencies, [12] products, and services. As of Februaryovermerchants and vendors accepted bitcoin as payment. The word bitcoin first occurred btc bitcoin wikipedia was defined in the white paper [5] that was published on 31 October There is no uniform convention for bitcoin capitalization.

Some sources use Bitcoincapitalized, to refer to the technology and network and bitcoinlowercase, to refer to the unit of account. The unit of account of the bitcoin system is a btc bitcoin wikipedia.

Named in homage to bitcoin's creator, a satoshi is the smallest amount within bitcoin representing 0. As with most new symbols, font support is very limited. Typefaces supporting it include Horta. On 18 Augustthe domain name "bitcoin. In Januarythe bitcoin network came into existence after Satoshi Nakamoto mined the first ever block on the btc bitcoin wikipedia, known as the genesis block.

This note has been interpreted as both a timestamp of the genesis date and a derisive comment on the instability caused by fractional-reserve banking. The receiver of the first bitcoin transaction was cypherpunk Hal Finneywho btc bitcoin wikipedia the first reusable proof-of-work system RPOW in In the early days, Nakamoto is estimated to have mined 1 million bitcoins.

So, if I get hit by a bus, it would be clear that the project would go on. Over the history of Bitcoin there have been several spins offs and deliberate hard forks that have lived on as separate blockchains.

These have come to be known as "altcoins", short for alternative coins, since Bitcoin was the first blockchain and these are btc bitcoin wikipedia of it. These spin offs occur so that new ideas can be tested, when the scope of that idea is outside that of Bitcoin, or when the community is split about merging such changes. Since then there have been numerous forks of Bitcoin. See list of bitcoin forks. The blockchain is a public ledger that records bitcoin transactions.

A novel solution accomplishes this without any trusted central authority: The blockchain is a distributed database — to achieve independent verification of the chain of ownership of any and every bitcoin amount, each network node btc bitcoin wikipedia its own copy of the blockchain. This allows bitcoin software to determine when a particular bitcoin amount has been spent, which is necessary in order to prevent double-spending in an environment without central oversight.

Whereas a conventional ledger records the transfers of actual bills or promissory btc bitcoin wikipedia that exist apart from it, the btc bitcoin wikipedia is the only place that bitcoins can be said to exist in the form of unspent outputs of transactions. Transactions are defined using a Forth -like scripting language.

When a user sends bitcoins, the user designates each address and the amount of bitcoin being sent to that address in an output. To prevent double spending, each input must refer to a previous unspent output btc bitcoin wikipedia the blockchain. Since transactions can have multiple outputs, users can btc bitcoin wikipedia bitcoins to multiple recipients in one transaction.

As in a cash transaction, the sum of inputs coins used to pay can exceed the intended sum of payments. In such a case, an additional output is used, returning the change back to the payer. Paying a transaction fee is optional. Because the size of mined blocks is capped by the network, miners choose transactions based on the fee paid relative to their storage size, not the absolute amount of money paid as a fee.

The size of transactions is dependent on the number of inputs used to create the transaction, btc bitcoin wikipedia the number of outputs. In the blockchain, bitcoins are registered to bitcoin addresses. Creating a bitcoin address is nothing more than picking a random valid private key and computing the corresponding bitcoin address.

This computation can be done in a split second. But the reverse computing the private key of a given bitcoin address is mathematically unfeasible and so users can tell others and make public a bitcoin address without compromising its corresponding private key.

Moreover, the number of valid private keys is so vast that it is extremely unlikely someone will compute a key-pair that is already in use and has funds. The vast number of valid private keys makes it unfeasible btc bitcoin wikipedia brute force could be used for that. To be able to spend the bitcoins, the owner must know the corresponding private key and digitally sign the transaction.

The network verifies the signature using the public key. If the private key is lost, the bitcoin network will not recognize any other evidence of ownership; [8] the coins are then btc bitcoin wikipedia, and effectively lost. Mining is a record-keeping service done btc bitcoin wikipedia the use of computer processing power. To be accepted by the rest of the network, a new block must contain a so-called proof-of-work PoW. Every 2, blocks approximately 14 days at roughly 10 min per blockthe difficulty target is adjusted based on the network's recent performance, with the aim of keeping the average time between new blocks at ten minutes.

In this way the system automatically adapts to the total amount of mining power on the network. The proof-of-work system, alongside the chaining of blocks, makes modifications of the blockchain extremely hard, as an attacker must modify all subsequent blocks in order for the modifications of one block to be accepted.

Computing btc bitcoin wikipedia is often bundled together or "pooled" to reduce variance in miner income. Individual mining rigs often btc bitcoin wikipedia to wait for long periods to confirm a block of transactions and receive payment.

In a pool, all participating miners get paid every time a participating server solves btc bitcoin wikipedia block. This payment depends on the amount of work an individual miner contributed to help find that block.

The successful miner finding the new block is btc bitcoin wikipedia with newly created bitcoins and transaction fees. To claim the reward, a special transaction called a coinbase is included with the processed payments. The bitcoin protocol specifies that the reward for adding a block will be halved everyblocks approximately btc bitcoin wikipedia four years. Eventually, the reward will decrease to zero, and the limit of 21 million bitcoins [f] will be reached c.

Their numbers are being released roughly every ten minutes and the rate at which they are generated would drop by half every four years until all were in circulation.

A wallet stores the information necessary to transact bitcoins. While wallets are often described as a place to hold [59] or store bitcoins, [60] due to the nature of the system, bitcoins are inseparable from the blockchain transaction ledger. A better way to describe a wallet is something that "stores the digital credentials for your btc bitcoin wikipedia holdings" [60] and allows one to access and spend them.

Bitcoin uses public-key cryptographyin which two cryptographic keys, one public and one private, are generated. There are three modes which wallets can operate in. They have an inverse relationship with regards to trustlessness and computational requirements. Third-party internet services called online wallets btc bitcoin wikipedia similar functionality but may be easier to use. In this case, credentials to access funds are stored with the online wallet provider rather than on the user's hardware.

A malicious provider or a breach in server security may cause entrusted bitcoins to be stolen. An example of such a security breach occurred with Mt. Physical wallets store offline the credentials necessary to spend bitcoins. Another type of wallet called a hardware wallet keeps credentials offline while facilitating transactions. The first wallet program — simply named "Bitcoin" — was released in by Satoshi Nakamoto as open-source code.

While a btc bitcoin wikipedia system cannot have an "official" implementation, Bitcoin Core is considered by some to be bitcoin's preferred implementation. Bitcoin was designed not to need a central authority [5] and the bitcoin network is considered to be decentralized. In mining pool Ghash. The pool has voluntarily capped their hashing power at Bitcoin is pseudonymousmeaning that funds are not tied to real-world entities but rather bitcoin addresses.

Owners of bitcoin addresses are not explicitly identified, but all transactions on the blockchain are public. In addition, transactions can be linked to individuals and companies through "idioms of use" e.

To heighten financial privacy, a new bitcoin address can be generated for each transaction. Wallets and similar software technically handle all bitcoins as equivalent, establishing the basic level of fungibility. Researchers have pointed out that the history of each bitcoin is registered and publicly available in the blockchain ledger, and that some users may refuse to accept bitcoins coming from controversial transactions, which would harm bitcoin's fungibility.

The blocks in the blockchain were originally limited to 32 megabyte in size. The block size limit of one megabyte was introduced by Satoshi Nakamoto inas an anti-spam measure. Transaction records traditionally contain a certain amount of data that is mostly only used while confirming the block in question; it does not serve any real purpose once the block is safely on the chain.

SegWit introduces a new transaction format that segregates these record fields from record fields of lasting value such as ID, sender, recipient, or amount. The segregated data, the so-called witnessis not sent to non-SegWit nodes and therefore does not form part of the blockchain as seen by legacy nodes.

This lowers the size of the average transaction, thereby btc bitcoin wikipedia the effective carrying capacity of each block without incurring the hard fork implied by a conventional block size increase. Bitcoin is a digital asset designed by its btc bitcoin wikipedia, Satoshi Nakamoto, to work as a currency.

The question whether bitcoin is a currency or not is still btc bitcoin wikipedia. According to research produced by Cambridge Universitythere were between 2. The number of users has grown significantly sincewhen there wereto 1. Inthe number of merchants accepting bitcoin exceededReasons for this fall include high transaction fees due to bitcoin's scalability issues, long transaction times and a rise in value making consumers unwilling to spend it.

Merchants accepting bitcoin ordinarily use the services of bitcoin payment service btc bitcoin wikipedia such as BitPay or Coinbase. When a customer pays in bitcoin, the payment service provider accepts the btc bitcoin wikipedia on behalf of the merchant, converts it to the local currency, and sends the obtained amount to merchant's bank account, charging a fee for the btc bitcoin wikipedia.

Bitcoins can be bought on digital currency exchanges. According to Tony Gallippia co-founder of BitPay"banks are scared to deal with bitcoin companies, even if they really want to". In a report, Bank of America Merrill Lynch stated that "we btc bitcoin wikipedia bitcoin can become a major means of payment for e-commerce and may emerge as a serious competitor to traditional money-transfer providers.