Bitcoin is a digital currency that is not backed by any country's central bank or government. Bitcoins can be traded for goods or services with vendors who accept bitcoins as payment. Originally developed for virtual world payments by pseudonymous developer Satoshi Nakamoto in 2009, bitcoins have seen their values rise to historic highs in recent years. Using cryptography to securely manage fund transfers, bitcoin transactions are made by digitally exchanging anonymous, heavily encrypted hash codes across a peer-to-peer (P2P) network. Transactions are verified by a decentralized network of computers all over the world. Specialized computers use a proof-of-work system to prevent people from copying and spending the same bitcoin multiple times, a problem for digital currencies known as double-spending. The operators of these computers, known as "miners", are rewarded with transaction fees and newly minted bitcoins.

Each user's bitcoins are stored in a program called a digital wallet, which also holds each address the user sends and receives bitcoins from, as well as a private key known only to the user. Digital wallets may be stored online on the web, on local hardware (like a personal computer or mobile device), or on paper print-outs.