Bitcoin counterfeit

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So, it is possible and actually easy to think that the same fate that has befallen fiat currency can hit it too. This reasoning is a actually a good starting point for sparking valuable self paced learning about whichever crypto of choice. Cryptocurrencies have been growing in the recent past, thanks to the growing acceptance and technology. Unlike in the last decade when bitcoin was the dominant crypto, new ones continue to emerge which then raises worries and legitimate concerns about possibility of fake ones.

Nobody ever wants to imagine waking up one day and being told that his bitcoins are counterfeit or maybe being accused of it. Sorry of this talk gives you goose bumps or sends you thinking of rushing to cash out your bitcoins. One last thing before you rethink about the legitimacy of your coins is that the technology that supports crypto cannot allow counterfeiting to take place. The process of validating a crypto requires a series of computers connected by powerful technology that does not allow malicious activity.

If anything, cryptocurrencies get their prestige position because of the difficulty to be counterfeited. You can be sure that whatever crypto is lying in your account at the moment are legit and valuable.

Nobody will approach you whatsoever to accuse of holding counterfeits. No governments or such agencies are involved in the crypto ecosystem which tells why it impossible to counterfeit. Cryptocurrencies being virtual currencies is an indication that they can be counterfeited. In any digital environment, anything may be cracked or even copied.

The same things that happen to books, films, and music that are pirated also take place in the cryptocurrency world. However, in the case of Bitcoin, it is a bit unique. It is important to note that even though cryptocurrencies can be copied, it is very difficult to counterfeit them. The way the system of bitcoin is structured, one cannot double-spend or even generate over one transaction just in one operation.

Therefore, the system eliminates the issue of counterfeiting. The cryptocurrency market is overinflated. Thus, because of the issue of market manipulation, there are several bitcoin exchange-traded funds that have been held up for regulatory approval.

Bitcoin has been regarded as a Ponzi scheme mainly because the people who joined the pyramid at an earlier stage are the ones who highly benefit. Bitcoin currency has never been hacked, and there are no chances that it may ever get hacked. Initially, in , Wences Casares, an entrepreneur, heard about the name Bitcoin but was not convinced regarding its claim.

During those times, Bitcoin seemed to be a good cryptocurrency though it had some vulnerabilities. Unfortunately, they were unsuccessful after six months of serious investigations. According to them, the system is well built, which they could not hack.

The issue made him a great supporter of Bitcoin. The story is an indication that even though people have tried to counterfeit currencies such as bitcoin, they have been unsuccessful in their operations. Since the launch of Bitcoin, it has been attacked over times, and all the operations have been unsuccessful. Cryptocurrencies use distributed ledgers, which is blockchain technology.

Besides, the other bitcoin users have the same. Lit means that when every individual has a copy, then they all agree with each other regarding what each person owns.

There is no person who has the authority to change the transaction history. Besides, it cannot be done on the computers of another individual. However, they may locally change it. If they choose this option, the transaction will be refused because the overall network consensus does not tally with their copy. There are some things that make it difficult for bitcoin to be counterfeited. First, it is because it is not a physical currency.

Bitcoin is a virtual currency even though it has all properties of good money. Moreover, it has attracted attention, including being a divisible medium of storing value, scarce, and money for the peer-to-peer transaction. There is nothing that is preventing individuals across the globe from counterfeiting the various digital currencies. This refers to a situation in which a user "spends" or transfers the same bitcoin in two or more separate settings, effectively creating a duplicate record.

What makes double-spending unlikely, though, is the size of the Bitcoin network. By controlling a majority of all network power, this group could dominate the remainder of the network to falsify records. However, such an attack on Bitcoin would require an overwhelming amount of effort, money, and computing power, thereby rendering the possibility extremely unlikely.

But Bitcoin often fails the utility test because people rarely use it for retail transactions. The main source of value for Bitcoin is its scarcity. The argument for Bitcoin's value is similar to that of goldпїЅa commodity that shares characteristics with the cryptocurrency.

The cryptocurrency is limited to a quantity of 21 million. Bitcoin is much more divisible than fiat currencies. One bitcoin can be divided into up to eight decimal places, with constituent units called satoshis.

Most fiat currencies can only be divided into two decimal places for everyday use. If Bitcoin's price continues to rise over time, users with a tiny fraction of a bitcoin will still be able to make transactions with the cryptocurrency. The development of side channels, such as the Lightning Network, may further boost the value of Bitcoin's economy.

Bitcoin's value is a function of this scarcity. As the supply diminishes, demand for cryptocurrency has increased. Investors are clamoring for a slice of the ever-increasing profit pie that results from trading its limited supply. Bitcoin also has limited utility like gold, the applications for which are mainly industrial. Bitcoin's underlying technology, called blockchain, is tested and used as a payment system. One of its most effective use cases is in remittances across borders to bump up speed and drive down costs.

Some countries, like El Salvador, are betting that Bitcoin's technology will evolve sufficiently to become a medium for daily transactions. Another theory is that Bitcoin does have intrinsic value based on the marginal cost of producing one bitcoin. Mining for bitcoins involves a great deal of electricity, and this imposes a real cost on miners. According to economic theory, in a competitive market among producers all making the same product, the selling price of that product will tend towards its marginal cost of production.

Empirical evidence has shown that the price of a bitcoin tends to follow the cost of production. Monetarists try to value bitcoin as they would money, using the supply of money, its velocity, and the value of goods produced in an economy. The simplest way to this approach would be to look at the current worldwide value of all mediums of exchange and of all stores of value comparable to Bitcoin and then calculate the value of Bitcoin's projected percentage.

The predominant medium of exchange is government-backed money , and for our model, we will focus solely on that. Roughly speaking, the money supply M1 in the U. El Salvador became the first country to make Bitcoin legal tender on Sept 7, The cryptocurrency can be used for any transaction where the business can accept it.

One of the biggest issues is Bitcoin's status as a store of value. Bitcoin's utility as a store of value depends on how well it works as a medium of exchange. If Bitcoin does not achieve success as a medium of exchange, it will not be useful as a store of value.

Throughout much of its history, speculative interest has been the primary driver of Bitcoin's value. Bitcoin has exhibited the characteristics of a bubble with drastic price run-ups and a craze of media attention. This is likely to decline as Bitcoin continues to see greater mainstream adoption, but the future is uncertain.

Difficulties surrounding cryptocurrency storage and exchange spaces also challenge Bitcoin's utility and transferability. In recent years, hacks, thefts, and fraud have plagued digital currency. Like any asset or thing of value, the price that people are willing to pay for Bitcoins is a socially-agreed upon level that is also based on supply and demand. Because Bitcoins are virtual, only existing within computer networks, some people have a hard time grasping that Bitcoins are scarce and that they have a cost of production.

Because of this unwillingness to accept that digital traces can hold value in this way, they remain convinced that Bitcoins are worthless. Others who understand the Bitcoin system agree it is valuable. The market price of Bitcoin is highly volatile and subject to large price swings. As a result, the market price at any given time may vary wildly from its fair or intrinsic value. Still, over time, oversold markets tend to rebound and overbought markets cool off.

Thus, it is impossible to say at any given moment whether Bitcoins are fairly valued without the benefit of hindsight. While Bitcoin has several money-like features, economists and regulators remain unconvinced that Bitcoin currently acts as money. This is because relatively few transactions are conducted in Bitcoins and very few things are denominated in Bitcoins. While people may trade Bitcoin in large volume and transfer value across the network, little commercial activity still takes place.

The cost to produce one bitcoin depends on the cost of electricity, the mining difficulty, the block reward, and the energy efficiency of miners. With a block reward of 6. Since each individual's situation is unique, a qualified professional should always be consulted before making any financial decisions. Investopedia makes no representations or warranties as to the accuracy or timeliness of the information contained herein.

As of the date this article was written, the author owns cryptocurrency. Congressional Research Service. Yale Law School. Federal Reserve History. CBS News. International Trade Administration. Hayes, Adam. Federal Reserve Bank of St. Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Your Money. Personal Finance. Your Practice. Popular Courses. Table of Contents Expand.

Table of Contents. Value in Traditional Currencies. Value of Digital Currencies. Why Does Bitcoin Have Value?

The Challenges of Valuing Bitcoin. Bitcoins Value FAQs. Cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Key Takeaways Currencies have value because they can function as a store of value and a unit of exchange.

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The simplest way to this approach would be to look at the current worldwide value of all mediums of exchange and of all stores of value comparable to Bitcoin and then calculate the value of Bitcoin's projected percentage. The predominant medium of exchange is government-backed money , and for our model, we will focus solely on that.

Roughly speaking, the money supply M1 in the U. El Salvador became the first country to make Bitcoin legal tender on Sept 7, The cryptocurrency can be used for any transaction where the business can accept it. One of the biggest issues is Bitcoin's status as a store of value. Bitcoin's utility as a store of value depends on how well it works as a medium of exchange. If Bitcoin does not achieve success as a medium of exchange, it will not be useful as a store of value.

Throughout much of its history, speculative interest has been the primary driver of Bitcoin's value. Bitcoin has exhibited the characteristics of a bubble with drastic price run-ups and a craze of media attention. This is likely to decline as Bitcoin continues to see greater mainstream adoption, but the future is uncertain. Difficulties surrounding cryptocurrency storage and exchange spaces also challenge Bitcoin's utility and transferability.

In recent years, hacks, thefts, and fraud have plagued digital currency. Like any asset or thing of value, the price that people are willing to pay for Bitcoins is a socially-agreed upon level that is also based on supply and demand.

Because Bitcoins are virtual, only existing within computer networks, some people have a hard time grasping that Bitcoins are scarce and that they have a cost of production. Because of this unwillingness to accept that digital traces can hold value in this way, they remain convinced that Bitcoins are worthless. Others who understand the Bitcoin system agree it is valuable. The market price of Bitcoin is highly volatile and subject to large price swings.

As a result, the market price at any given time may vary wildly from its fair or intrinsic value. Still, over time, oversold markets tend to rebound and overbought markets cool off. Thus, it is impossible to say at any given moment whether Bitcoins are fairly valued without the benefit of hindsight. While Bitcoin has several money-like features, economists and regulators remain unconvinced that Bitcoin currently acts as money.

This is because relatively few transactions are conducted in Bitcoins and very few things are denominated in Bitcoins. While people may trade Bitcoin in large volume and transfer value across the network, little commercial activity still takes place. The cost to produce one bitcoin depends on the cost of electricity, the mining difficulty, the block reward, and the energy efficiency of miners.

With a block reward of 6. Since each individual's situation is unique, a qualified professional should always be consulted before making any financial decisions. Investopedia makes no representations or warranties as to the accuracy or timeliness of the information contained herein. As of the date this article was written, the author owns cryptocurrency. Congressional Research Service.

Yale Law School. Federal Reserve History. CBS News. International Trade Administration. Hayes, Adam. Federal Reserve Bank of St. Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Your Money. Personal Finance. Your Practice. Popular Courses. Table of Contents Expand. Table of Contents.

Value in Traditional Currencies. Value of Digital Currencies. Why Does Bitcoin Have Value? The Challenges of Valuing Bitcoin. Bitcoins Value FAQs. Cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Key Takeaways Currencies have value because they can function as a store of value and a unit of exchange.

They also demonstrate six key attributes to enable their use in an economy. The definition of value in a currency has changed over centuries from physical attributes to the velocity of its use in an economy. Bitcoin demonstrates some attributes for a currency, but its main source of value lies in its restricted supply and increasing demand. Are Bitcoins Fairly Valued? Is Bitcoin Money? Article Sources. Investopedia requires writers to use primary sources to support their work.

These include white papers, government data, original reporting, and interviews with industry experts. We also reference original research from other reputable publishers where appropriate. You can learn more about the standards we follow in producing accurate, unbiased content in our editorial policy. Compare Accounts.

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Related Articles. Bitcoin Are There Taxes on Bitcoin? Cryptocurrency Top Cryptocurrency Myths. Bitcoin Bitcoin vs. Partner Links. Related Terms. Cryptocurrency Explained With Pros and Cons for Investment A cryptocurrency is a digital or virtual currency that uses cryptography and is difficult to counterfeit. Stablecoins: Definition, How They Work, and Types Bridging the gap between fiat currency and cryptocurrency, stablecoins aim to achieve stable price valuation using different working mechanisms.

Medium of Exchange: Definition, How It Works, and Example A medium of exchange is an intermediary instrument, such as currency, that is used to facilitate the purchase and sale of goods between parties.

Definition, How It Works, Vs. Bitcoin Ether is the native cryptocurrency for the Ethereum blockchain and network. The number of new bitcoins created each year is automatically halved over time until bitcoin issuance halts completely with a total of 21 million bitcoins in existence. At this point, Bitcoin miners will probably be supported exclusively by numerous small transaction fees.

Bitcoins have value because they are useful as a form of money. Bitcoin has the characteristics of money durability, portability, fungibility, scarcity, divisibility, and recognizability based on the properties of mathematics rather than relying on physical properties like gold and silver or trust in central authorities like fiat currencies. In short, Bitcoin is backed by mathematics. With these attributes, all that is required for a form of money to hold value is trust and adoption.

In the case of Bitcoin, this can be measured by its growing base of users, merchants, and startups. As with all currency, bitcoin's value comes only and directly from people willing to accept them as payment.

The price of a bitcoin is determined by supply and demand. When demand for bitcoins increases, the price increases, and when demand falls, the price falls. There is only a limited number of bitcoins in circulation and new bitcoins are created at a predictable and decreasing rate, which means that demand must follow this level of inflation to keep the price stable.

Because Bitcoin is still a relatively small market compared to what it could be, it doesn't take significant amounts of money to move the market price up or down, and thus the price of a bitcoin is still very volatile. Bitcoin price over time:. History is littered with currencies that failed and are no longer used, such as the German Mark during the Weimar Republic and, more recently, the Zimbabwean dollar.

Although previous currency failures were typically due to hyperinflation of a kind that Bitcoin makes impossible, there is always potential for technical failures, competing currencies, political issues and so on.

As a basic rule of thumb, no currency should be considered absolutely safe from failures or hard times. Bitcoin has proven reliable for years since its inception and there is a lot of potential for Bitcoin to continue to grow.

However, no one is in a position to predict what the future will be for Bitcoin. A fast rise in price does not constitute a bubble. An artificial over-valuation that will lead to a sudden downward correction constitutes a bubble. Choices based on individual human action by hundreds of thousands of market participants is the cause for bitcoin's price to fluctuate as the market seeks price discovery.

Reasons for changes in sentiment may include a loss of confidence in Bitcoin, a large difference between value and price not based on the fundamentals of the Bitcoin economy, increased press coverage stimulating speculative demand, fear of uncertainty, and old-fashioned irrational exuberance and greed. A Ponzi scheme is a fraudulent investment operation that pays returns to its investors from their own money, or the money paid by subsequent investors, instead of from profit earned by the individuals running the business.

Ponzi schemes are designed to collapse at the expense of the last investors when there is not enough new participants. Bitcoin is a free software project with no central authority. Consequently, no one is in a position to make fraudulent representations about investment returns. Like other major currencies such as gold, United States dollar, euro, yen, etc. This leads to volatility where owners of bitcoins can unpredictably make or lose money.

Beyond speculation, Bitcoin is also a payment system with useful and competitive attributes that are being used by thousands of users and businesses. Some early adopters have large numbers of bitcoins because they took risks and invested time and resources in an unproven technology that was hardly used by anyone and that was much harder to secure properly.

Many early adopters spent large numbers of bitcoins quite a few times before they became valuable or bought only small amounts and didn't make huge gains. There is no guarantee that the price of a bitcoin will increase or drop.

This is very similar to investing in an early startup that can either gain value through its usefulness and popularity, or just never break through. Bitcoin is still in its infancy, and it has been designed with a very long-term view; it is hard to imagine how it could be less biased towards early adopters, and today's users may or may not be the early adopters of tomorrow. Bitcoin is unique in that only 21 million bitcoins will ever be created. However, this will never be a limitation because transactions can be denominated in smaller sub-units of a bitcoin, such as bits - there are 1,, bits in 1 bitcoin.

Bitcoins can be divided up to 8 decimal places 0. The deflationary spiral theory says that if prices are expected to fall, people will move purchases into the future in order to benefit from the lower prices. That fall in demand will in turn cause merchants to lower their prices to try and stimulate demand, making the problem worse and leading to an economic depression.

Although this theory is a popular way to justify inflation amongst central bankers, it does not appear to always hold true and is considered controversial amongst economists. Consumer electronics is one example of a market where prices constantly fall but which is not in depression. Similarly, the value of bitcoins has risen over time and yet the size of the Bitcoin economy has also grown dramatically along with it. Because both the value of the currency and the size of its economy started at zero in , Bitcoin is a counterexample to the theory showing that it must sometimes be wrong.

Notwithstanding this, Bitcoin is not designed to be a deflationary currency. It is more accurate to say Bitcoin is intended to inflate in its early years, and become stable in its later years. The only time the quantity of bitcoins in circulation will drop is if people carelessly lose their wallets by failing to make backups. With a stable monetary base and a stable economy, the value of the currency should remain the same. This is a chicken and egg situation. For bitcoin's price to stabilize, a large scale economy needs to develop with more businesses and users.

For a large scale economy to develop, businesses and users will seek for price stability. Fortunately, volatility does not affect the main benefits of Bitcoin as a payment system to transfer money from point A to point B. It is possible for businesses to convert bitcoin payments to their local currency instantly, allowing them to profit from the advantages of Bitcoin without being subjected to price fluctuations.

Since Bitcoin offers many useful and unique features and properties, many users choose to use Bitcoin. With such solutions and incentives, it is possible that Bitcoin will mature and develop to a degree where price volatility will become limited. Only a fraction of bitcoins issued to date are found on the exchange markets for sale.

Bitcoin markets are competitive, meaning the price of a bitcoin will rise or fall depending on supply and demand. Additionally, new bitcoins will continue to be issued for decades to come. Therefore even the most determined buyer could not buy all the bitcoins in existence. This situation isn't to suggest, however, that the markets aren't vulnerable to price manipulation; it still doesn't take significant amounts of money to move the market price up or down, and thus Bitcoin remains a volatile asset thus far.

That can happen. For now, Bitcoin remains by far the most popular decentralized virtual currency, but there can be no guarantee that it will retain that position. There is already a set of alternative currencies inspired by Bitcoin.

It is however probably correct to assume that significant improvements would be required for a new currency to overtake Bitcoin in terms of established market, even though this remains unpredictable. Bitcoin could also conceivably adopt improvements of a competing currency so long as it doesn't change fundamental parts of the protocol.

Receiving notification of a payment is almost instant with Bitcoin. However, there is a delay before the network begins to confirm your transaction by including it in a block. A confirmation means that there is a consensus on the network that the bitcoins you received haven't been sent to anyone else and are considered your property. Once your transaction has been included in one block, it will continue to be buried under every block after it, which will exponentially consolidate this consensus and decrease the risk of a reversed transaction.

Each confirmation takes between a few seconds and 90 minutes, with 10 minutes being the average. If the transaction pays too low a fee or is otherwise atypical, getting the first confirmation can take much longer. Every user is free to determine at what point they consider a transaction sufficiently confirmed, but 6 confirmations is often considered to be as safe as waiting 6 months on a credit card transaction.

Transactions can be processed without fees, but trying to send free transactions can require waiting days or weeks. Although fees may increase over time, normal fees currently only cost a tiny amount. By default, all Bitcoin wallets listed on Bitcoin. Transaction fees are used as a protection against users sending transactions to overload the network and as a way to pay miners for their work helping to secure the network.

The precise manner in which fees work is still being developed and will change over time. Because the fee is not related to the amount of bitcoins being sent, it may seem extremely low or unfairly high. Instead, the fee is relative to the number of bytes in the transaction, so using multisig or spending multiple previously-received amounts may cost more than simpler transactions.

If your activity follows the pattern of conventional transactions, you won't have to pay unusually high fees. This works fine. The bitcoins will appear next time you start your wallet application. Bitcoins are not actually received by the software on your computer, they are appended to a public ledger that is shared between all the devices on the network.

If you are sent bitcoins when your wallet client program is not running and you later launch it, it will download blocks and catch up with any transactions it did not already know about, and the bitcoins will eventually appear as if they were just received in real time. Your wallet is only needed when you wish to spend bitcoins. Long synchronization time is only required with full node clients like Bitcoin Core. Technically speaking, synchronizing is the process of downloading and verifying all previous Bitcoin transactions on the network.

For some Bitcoin clients to calculate the spendable balance of your Bitcoin wallet and make new transactions, it needs to be aware of all previous transactions. This step can be resource intensive and requires sufficient bandwidth and storage to accommodate the full size of the block chain. For Bitcoin to remain secure, enough people should keep using full node clients because they perform the task of validating and relaying transactions.

Mining is the process of spending computing power to process transactions, secure the network, and keep everyone in the system synchronized together. It can be perceived like the Bitcoin data center except that it has been designed to be fully decentralized with miners operating in all countries and no individual having control over the network.

This process is referred to as "mining" as an analogy to gold mining because it is also a temporary mechanism used to issue new bitcoins. Unlike gold mining, however, Bitcoin mining provides a reward in exchange for useful services required to operate a secure payment network. Mining will still be required after the last bitcoin is issued. Anybody can become a Bitcoin miner by running software with specialized hardware. Mining software listens for transactions broadcast through the peer-to-peer network and performs appropriate tasks to process and confirm these transactions.

Bitcoin miners perform this work because they can earn transaction fees paid by users for faster transaction processing, and newly created bitcoins issued into existence according to a fixed formula. For new transactions to be confirmed, they need to be included in a block along with a mathematical proof of work. Such proofs are very hard to generate because there is no way to create them other than by trying billions of calculations per second.

This requires miners to perform these calculations before their blocks are accepted by the network and before they are rewarded.

As more people start to mine, the difficulty of finding valid blocks is automatically increased by the network to ensure that the average time to find a block remains equal to 10 minutes. As a result, mining is a very competitive business where no individual miner can control what is included in the block chain. The proof of work is also designed to depend on the previous block to force a chronological order in the block chain.

This makes it exponentially difficult to reverse previous transactions because this requires the recalculation of the proofs of work of all the subsequent blocks. When two blocks are found at the same time, miners work on the first block they receive and switch to the longest chain of blocks as soon as the next block is found. This allows mining to secure and maintain a global consensus based on processing power.

Bitcoin miners are neither able to cheat by increasing their own reward nor process fraudulent transactions that could corrupt the Bitcoin network because all Bitcoin nodes would reject any block that contains invalid data as per the rules of the Bitcoin protocol.

Consequently, the network remains secure even if not all Bitcoin miners can be trusted. Spending energy to secure and operate a payment system is hardly a waste. Like any other payment service, the use of Bitcoin entails processing costs. Services necessary for the operation of currently widespread monetary systems, such as banks, credit cards, and armored vehicles, also use a lot of energy. Although unlike Bitcoin, their total energy consumption is not transparent and cannot be as easily measured.

Bitcoin mining has been designed to become more optimized over time with specialized hardware consuming less energy, and the operating costs of mining should continue to be proportional to demand. When Bitcoin mining becomes too competitive and less profitable, some miners choose to stop their activities.

Furthermore, all energy expended mining is eventually transformed into heat, and the most profitable miners will be those who have put this heat to good use. An optimally efficient mining network is one that isn't actually consuming any extra energy.

While this is an ideal, the economics of mining are such that miners individually strive toward it. Mining creates the equivalent of a competitive lottery that makes it very difficult for anyone to consecutively add new blocks of transactions into the block chain. This protects the neutrality of the network by preventing any individual from gaining the power to block certain transactions.

This also prevents any individual from replacing parts of the block chain to roll back their own spends, which could be used to defraud other users. Mining makes it exponentially more difficult to reverse a past transaction by requiring the rewriting of all blocks following this transaction.

In the early days of Bitcoin, anyone could find a new block using their computer's CPU. As more and more people started mining, the difficulty of finding new blocks increased greatly to the point where the only cost-effective method of mining today is using specialized hardware.

You can visit BitcoinMining. The Bitcoin technology - the protocol and the cryptography - has a strong security track record, and the Bitcoin network is probably the biggest distributed computing project in the world. Bitcoin's most common vulnerability is in user error. Bitcoin wallet files that store the necessary private keys can be accidentally deleted, lost or stolen.

This is pretty similar to physical cash stored in a digital form. Fortunately, users can employ sound security practices to protect their money or use service providers that offer good levels of security and insurance against theft or loss.

The rules of the protocol and the cryptography used for Bitcoin are still working years after its inception, which is a good indication that the concept is well designed. However, security flaws have been found and fixed over time in various software implementations.

Like any other form of software, the security of Bitcoin software depends on the speed with which problems are found and fixed. The more such issues are discovered, the more Bitcoin is gaining maturity. There are often misconceptions about thefts and security breaches that happened on diverse exchanges and businesses.

Although these events are unfortunate, none of them involve Bitcoin itself being hacked, nor imply inherent flaws in Bitcoin; just like a bank robbery doesn't mean that the dollar is compromised. However, it is accurate to say that a complete set of good practices and intuitive security solutions is needed to give users better protection of their money, and to reduce the general risk of theft and loss.

Over the course of the last few years, such security features have quickly developed, such as wallet encryption, offline wallets, hardware wallets, and multi-signature transactions. It is not possible to change the Bitcoin protocol that easily. Any Bitcoin client that doesn't comply with the same rules cannot enforce their own rules on other users. As per the current specification, double spending is not possible on the same block chain, and neither is spending bitcoins without a valid signature.

Therefore, it is not possible to generate uncontrolled amounts of bitcoins out of thin air, spend other users' funds, corrupt the network, or anything similar. However, powerful miners could arbitrarily choose to block or reverse recent transactions.

A majority of users can also put pressure for some changes to be adopted. Because Bitcoin only works correctly with a complete consensus between all users, changing the protocol can be very difficult and requires an overwhelming majority of users to adopt the changes in such a way that remaining users have nearly no choice but to follow.

As a general rule, it is hard to imagine why any Bitcoin user would choose to adopt any change that could compromise their own money. Yes, most systems relying on cryptography in general are, including traditional banking systems. However, quantum computers don't yet exist and probably won't for a while.

In the event that quantum computing could be an imminent threat to Bitcoin, the protocol could be upgraded to use post-quantum algorithms. Given the importance that this update would have, it can be safely expected that it would be highly reviewed by developers and adopted by all Bitcoin users.

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Frequently Asked Questions Find answers to recurring questions and myths about Bitcoin. View All General What is Bitcoin? Who created Bitcoin? Who controls the Bitcoin network? How does Bitcoin work? Is Bitcoin really used by people? How does one acquire bitcoins? How difficult is it to make a Bitcoin payment?

What are the advantages of Bitcoin? What are the disadvantages of Bitcoin? Why do people trust Bitcoin? Can I make money with Bitcoin? Is Bitcoin fully virtual and immaterial? Is Bitcoin anonymous? What happens when bitcoins are lost? Can Bitcoin scale to become a major payment network? Legal Is Bitcoin legal? Is Bitcoin useful for illegal activities?

Can Bitcoin be regulated? What about Bitcoin and taxes? What about Bitcoin and consumer protection? Economy How are bitcoins created? Why do bitcoins have value? Can bitcoins become worthless? Is Bitcoin a bubble? Is Bitcoin a Ponzi scheme? What if someone bought up all the existing bitcoins?