HOW BITCOIN MINING WORKS
Discover the tools that Bitcoin miners use to gain valuable cryptocurrency
WORDS MARK SMITH
Masses of servers are used for mining cryptocurrencies
DID YOU KNOW?
The first-ever Bitcoin transact ion took place in 2010, when a man in Florida paid 10,000 BTC for two pizzas
I t was in the late-1800s that hundreds of thousands of prospectors descended on the Klondike in Canada to mine for gold. It was known as the ‘gold rush’, and some of them found their fortunes. Many didn’t find anything at all - and over a century later people are trying the same thing. But this time, instead of spades and pickaxes, they’re using computers. It’s known as ‘crypto mining’ and since the launch of the first cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, in 2009, more and more people have tried to find their fortune by mining it and other virtual currencies. You may have heard of Bitcoin, but there are many more cryptocurrencies out there – over 5,000, in fact.