#marscoinecosystem

At the peak of the financial crisis of 2008, murmur began in tiny online communities of cryptography enthusiasts, computer scientists and hackers. A white paper styled research paper titled “Bitcoin Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” was broadcasted on a cryptography mailing list of the community. The author? Satoshi Nakamoto.

Satoshi wasn’t an unheard name within the communities. Years before the world heard of him, someone using the Satoshi pseudonym had been posting to forums and emailing fellow developers, never confirming a location, gender, nationality or even a real name. 

The first mention

The real identity of the creator of Bitcoin is one of the most gripping modern-day mysteries. Especially since the April of 2011, when Satoshi left a final message with a fellow developer “I’ve moved onto other things.” And just like that, he disappeared.

Satoshi was the pioneer of an entirely new kind of money that has taken the world by storm and has gone on to achieve a market cap of more than $1Trillion. Yet, the creator remains anonymous.

In 2007, Satoshi began coding the first version of Bitcoin in the C++ programming language. Before sharing it widely on the cryptography mailing list, Satoshi shared his ideas with the founders of proto-cryptocurrencies Hashcash and b-money. The idea was met with scepticism by the community that was used going through revolutionary ideas that did not see the light of the day.

Satoshi’s legacy

The appeal in his paper however, was the idea of building a cash system completely independent from the existing financial system. Satoshi’s answer to the issue of digital currency duplication, which he referred to as “the double-spending problem”, was to use a peer-to-peer network. This system would eliminate the need for any central authority to validate transactions. To his admission, prior attempts to digital currencies failed because of their centrally controlled nature. 

Traditional transactions are made based on trust. Intermediaries such as banks or internet commerce platforms are trusted to complete transactions as they fall under a centralized authority. Satoshi’s proposed decentralized system did not work based on trust. Instead, this trust-less system was the basis of Blockchain. A Blockchain is a publicly shared ledger that can document all transactions.

Who is Satoshi Nakamoto?

Satoshi left the text “The Times 03/Jan/2009 Chancellor on brink of second bailout for banks” of the Genesis block, the first block to be mined on the Bitcoins blockchain. It was considered a potential easter egg. The text was from a headline on that day’s Times of London. Additionally, his liberal use of British phrases has led people to believe that Satoshi must hail from the United Kingdom. However, Satoshi once described himself as a 37-year-old man living in Japan. 

Theories have also been devised that Satoshi Nakamoto is a cohort and not an individual. If not, he is a highly intelligent developer with a multifaceted understanding of Economics, Cryptography and Peer-to-peer networking and amongst other things.

Another favorite suspect for theorists to zero down on as Satoshi has been Hal Finney. Finney was the first cryptographer to receive Bitcoin when Nakamoto finished the first-ever transaction on Bitcoins blockchain. Even on his deathbed, Finney denied these claims.

Len Sassaman is considered another possible suspect. Sassaman killed himself after battling depression in 2011. Coincidentally, in Satoshi’s last few communications, he sent a cryptic email to a fellow developer that he “probably won’t be around in the future.”

Blockchain may seem like a cumbersome concept, but at its core it is a system of data storage and management. The goal of blockchain is to allow digital information to be recorded and distributed, but not edited. Essentially, a type of database, blockchain is the technological backbone on which cryptocurrency is developed. 

What exactly is blockchain?

Blockchain is a shared, unchangeable ledger that facilitates the process of recording transactions and tracking assets in a business network. Assets can be both: tangible, such as a house, a car or land, or intangible in nature, such as intellectual property, patents, and even cryptocurrency. Anything that has a value associated with it can be tracked and traded on a blockchain network, making it secure and inexpensive.

How is data stored on a blockchain?

A blockchain structures its data into chunks that are chained together. Information is collected together in groups, also known as blocks, which hold sets of information. Blocks have certain storage capacities, and when filled, are chained onto the previously filled block. This forms a chain of data known as the “blockchain.”

These blockchains in a decentralized network are a part of an irreversible timeline. When a block is filled, it becomes an immutable part of this timeline and also gets a timestamp attached to it.

How is a transaction logged?

When a new transaction entry is made, it gets transmitted to a network of peer-to-peer computers, located across the world. This network of computers ensures validity of the transaction by solving equations. Once the legitimacy of the transaction is verified, they are clustered together into blocks. These blocks are chained together creating a permanent and irreversible ledger of all transactions, thus completing the transaction.

What are some benefits of blockchain?

Accuracy - Transactions on a blockchain network are verified by a network of multiple computers. With human involvement being next to none, it eliminates all chances of human errors. Any computational mistakes are also reflected on a single copy of the blockchain.

Lower Costs - With no third party verification required to verify a transaction, such as a bank or a notary, the associated costs are also eliminated.

Decentralization - None of the information on a blockchain network is stored in a central location. Instead, the information is scattered across a network of computers. The addition of a new block is updated by every computer on the network. This makes blockchain networks difficult to be tampered with.

Speedier transactions - Traditional financial institutions go through a structure established by a central authority to complete transactions. On a blockchain network, cross border transactions can also be completed in a matter of minutes. These networks are also not bound by time and timezones.

Secure networks - Once a block is created, its authenticity is verified by the entire blockchain network. Each block on the blockchain has its own unique identification number called the hash. When a block is added on a blockchain, it consists of its own hash, as well as the hash of the previous block it was attached to. Editing information on the block leads to a new hash, however, the block after it still uses the old hash number. This makes it difficult to tamper the data within a block.