event’s took place which changed the dynamics of crypto world at large extent
Bitcoin, the undisputed king of cryptoverse since its inception is gaining attraction from techie’s and leaders across the world. Let’s take a look back in year 2015 where number of event’s took place which changed the dynamics of crypto world at large extent.
Bitcoin Not a Tool for Criminals
Through the Silk Road trial, the public image of bitcoin as weapon for a criminal due to its anonymity in transactions was shattered. The case proved that bitcoin can be a potential weapon against online financial crime. It provides the most transparent payment pathway. Ross Ulbricht, the founder of Silk Road, the world’s biggest online illegal marketplace, was arrested for the illegal transaction of bitcoin to his wallet. Operators of the site hoped to make use of the anonymity in bitcoin transactions, who were into illegal drug dealings. As per reports, around $1 billion worth of transactions took place through the site and SilkRoad got a profit of $80 million.
But, FBI agent Ilhwan Yum’s testimony was the turning point in this case in which he simply matched the bitcoin addresses found in Silk Road Wallet and those there on Ross’s laptop. Thus proving direct transactions between them. Yum proved that transactions worth over 70,000 bitcoins have happened directly from Silk Road Wallet to Ross’s laptop. Don't use plagiarised sources.Get your custom essay just from $11/page
Bitcoin Blocksize
The debate about the block size on the bitcoin blockchain was put forward several times. In 2010, the data storage capacity of a block was reduced to 1 MB which was 36 MB earlier to avoid the possible risks of denial-of-service and spam issues. Though the limit remains the same, the transaction rate has increased 2.5 times as per the data released by TradeBlock, thus filling up the storage capacity. Gavin Andresen, an expert from Satoshi Nakamoto, argues for an increase in block size to handle increased transactions rate. Chinese mining pool, F2Pool, also stressed on the necessity of increased block size by analyzing the management of large scale spam attack on the network.
BitLicense, First NYDFS Registered Crytocurrency firm
NYDFS granted the first BitLicense to circle internet Financial in September 2015. Thus developing more confidence in the consumers about digital currency transactions. There were issues related to incompatibility between digital currency firms and jurisdictions, even though the bitcoin and blockchain technology has put plenty of actions to secure consumer protection.
Who’s Satoshi
In December 2015, Craig Wright was allegedly claimed to be Satoshi Nakamoto, the inventor of bitcoin by Wired and Gizmodo. Documents provided to Gizmodo claimed that bitcoin was jointly developed by Wright and Dave Kleiman, an American computer forensics expert. Consequently, police raided Wright’s home for further proofs. But the Australian Federal Police said that the raids were not regarding bitcoin at all.
Bitcoin Mainstream
China, despite the banning of bitcoin trading by People’s Bank of China in December 2014, is noted for a high trading activity of 80%. This raise is due to the faster transaction rate of digital currencies with lower transaction fees.
In Greece, bank closures to uplift the country from financial collapse led to the uptick of trading activity on Bitcoin trading platforms. Bitcoin.de told CNNMoney that the bitcoin trading rate in Greece has soared to become the world’s largest Bitcoin exchange at the time with an increase of 79%. The Shanghai-based LakeBTC saw an increase of visitors by 40% and Polish Exchange Bitcurex received several emails from Greeks asking questions on digital currencies.
In 2015, Bitcoin was classified as a commodity by Commodity Futures Trading Commission(CFTC), and therefore the same rules are applicable for bitcoin-related trading like any other participants in the commodity derivatives markets. The CFTC went on to take action against unregistered bitcoin trading firms for not complying with the rules and guidelines of the commodity exchange act.
In November 2015, the Unicode Committee, adopted the symbol of bitcoin currency to easily type on computers and devices.