• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Changelly
  • Price table

Crypto News PRO

From the world all news

  • Home
  • News

What was before crypto?

Written by:
Aeon Flux
Published on:
2 December 2020
Thoughts:
No comments yet

Read the article to find out about the pre-Bitcoin times

SimpleSwap.io

Even though we usually assume that crypto has started with Bitcoin, there were other predecessors that helped BTC to appear. The history of cryptocurrency says that the first attempts to create crypto were made 20 years before Bitcoin, let’s find it out!

The first alternative means of payment appeared as an attempt to solve the problem of nighttime thefts on gas stations in the Netherlands. Developers offered to avoid paying with cash by linking money to smartcards that were created especially for these stations and their customers. Drivers could use cards instead of cash, and thus the amount of cash was significantly decreased.

Another attempt was made by David Chaum, a cryptographer and computer scientist. He believed that in order to develop commerce electronic imitation of regular money was needed. David Chaum developed a way to encrypt information to pass it securely between individuals. It was called “blinded cash.” His invention was in fact an extension of the RSA cryptographic algorithm. David Chaum offered a concept of adding a signature of authenticity. Several years later, he founded DigiCash and put his ideas into practice. Even though DigiCash was not very successful, some of these ideas were used in modern technologies.

David Chaum, a cryptographer and computer scientist

In the 1990s, a number of startups appeared. They were trying to achieve goals that were set up by DigiCash. One of the greatest examples is PayPal. It signified a revolution in peer-to-peer payments. It was the first service that provided money transfers without the third party interference, it went straight from one person to another.

Flooz.com was a project in the late 90-s that tried to create an electronic currency that could be used uniquely for online trade. Users were supposed to accumulate flooz credits by purchasing something at Flooz.com, and then they could be exchanged for goods. The most interesting feature of this project was that customers could spend flooz not only on flooz.com but also on a number of other partner platforms.

Another project on the timeline of the history of cryptocurrency is B-money that was proposed in 1998 by Wei Dai. It was designed as an “anonymous, distributed electronic cash system.” The idea was to use two synchronous protocols. It also used pseudonyms to make money transfers within a decentralized network. Unfortunately, the innovation was unable to attract enough attention to launch.

Bit Gold was a project of the late 90-s, proposed by Nick Szabo. It had its own Proof-of-Work system. A part of it was later used in Bitcoin mining technology. Just as well as in a modern blockchain system solutions were encrypted and then published. Bit Gold was the first strong attempt to avoid centralization. In the end, the project turned out to be not very successful. However, it gave life to some new ideas that were developed later.

Nick Szabo, a computer scientist and cryptographer

Probably, the most lucrative project of the pre-Bitcoin times was Hashcash. There were a number of ideas behind this project, including the prevention of email spamming and DDoS attacks. Hashcash faced a lot of problems, such as the constant need in increasing the processing power. Even though this project was not able to survive through these things, it brought a lot of innovations that were used in Bitcoin as well.

It is impossible to imagine the creation of modern cryptocurrencies without a long period of different attempts. After looking back briefly at the history of crypto, we notice that the pre-Bitcoin time made a huge impact on the technologies that developed into today’s cryptocurrencies.

# cryptocurrency# Bitcoin# History of crypto# PayPal

Feel free to follow our updates and news on Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and Telegram.
Read what the customers say about SimpleSwap on Trustpilot.
Don’t hesitate to contact us with any questions you may have via
support@simpleswap.io.

Categories: Bitcoin, News

Reader Interactions

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Primary Sidebar

Search in the news

Translate:

Earn up to 5% every 10 days with Aeon Flux Coins

Categories

  • Bitcoin (2,469)
  • Ethereum (1,660)
  • News (5,205)

Recent Posts

  • Oil & Copper Point Each Point To Opposite Inflation Outcomes 25 June 2022
  • Across more than 10 countries, 500+ corporate executives signed up to GWEI 2022 — Singapore 25 June 2022
  • Three Long-term Regression-free Models for Bitcoin 24 June 2022
  • Is there space for tattoos in the metaverse? 24 June 2022
  • Misleading Metrics Like Accuracy Are Not Worth Your Time 24 June 2022

Archives

  • June 2022
  • May 2022
  • April 2022
  • March 2022
  • February 2022
  • January 2022
  • December 2021
  • November 2021
  • October 2021
  • September 2021
  • August 2021
  • July 2021
  • June 2021
  • May 2021
  • April 2021
  • March 2021
  • February 2021
  • January 2021
  • December 2020
  • November 2020
  • October 2020
  • September 2020
  • August 2020

© 2015-2020 Crypto News PRO
All Rights Reserved. Powered by IWG Agenzia Web