What is a Cryptocurrency?

What is Cryptography and how does it make cryptocurrencies secure?

Explore the Steem Genesis Block and Sign in as proof of completion.

What is a Cryptocurrency?

Cryptocurrency was derived from the word cryptography. Cryptocurrencies are digital currencies (they exist online). It is peer-to-peer and does not need a middleman to authenticate or facilitate transactions between parties like the banking system and therefore giving coin owners full control of their coins or tokens.

Cryptocurrencies use the public-private key cryptography technology to perform transactions on Blockchains. The private key as the name implies is a very important key which is used to send coin to anyone on the Blockchain. It is important to keep this key safe and secrete. The public key can be shared which basically is the address of the wallet. The private key and public key are entirely different as none can be used to derive the other.

Cryptocurrencies can be used to buy goods and services just like the normal fiat money.

What is Cryptography and how does it make cryptocurrencies secure?

Crypto currency originates from the word Cryptography. Cryptography is also derived from two words "Crypto" which means hidden, secrete, confidential, undisclosed and "Graph" which means to write. Therefore Cryptography is the practice and study of techniques for securing communication and data in the presence of enemies or other users with negative intentions. This deals with converting readable messages to unreadable format using a tool called encryption key and converting the unreadable message to readable format when it gets to the intended person using the decryption key. Cryptography is also called encryption.

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The above image explains the principle of cryptography. How plain messages are converted into unreadable formats and converted back to readable format.

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The image above illustrates a scenario where Andy sends a message to Sam but his message was altered by a hacker (Eave). When Sam receives the message and decrypts with the decryption key he gets an error showing the message sent to him has been altered. This is the hall mark of cryptography.

Having explained cryptography it is worthy to note that cryptography is the underlying principle of cryptocurrency. Which means cryptocurrency would not have been successful without the concept of cryptography

Explore the Steem Genesis Block and Sign in as proof of completion.

Genesis Block is also known as the Block 0 or Block 1 of any blockchain. It is the first block of any blockchain. The genesis block determines how other blocks will be added to the first block. This is what forms the word Blockchain (Block added to block).

To explore the steem Gnensis block, go through the following steps:
Step1: visit https://steemworld.org

Step2: click on block explorer

Step3: click on ok for block 1

Step4: details of steem genesis block

This is the details of the steem genesis block
• Timestamp : 2016-03-24 17:05:00 UTC + 1
• Block ID : 0000000109833ce528d5bbfb3f6225b39ee10086
• Previous Id: 0000000000000000000000000000000000000000
• Witness : initminer 25
• Witness Signature: 204f8ad56a8f5cf722a02b035a61b500aa59b9519b2c33c77

Signing in as a proof of completion

Step1: enter the web address on your address bar https://steemworld.org

Step1: click on the Sign In Button on the top right corner of the screen

Step2: enter username and posting key and click on OK

Signed In successful

Conclusion

Cryptocurrecy is a blessing to the world in this 21st century. It has improved the world financing and also the financing sector. Cryptography has added a lot to the cryptocurrency world making it to be protected when carrying out transactions.

Thanks to professor @awesononso for dishing out this breathtaking lecture. Though I had little knowledge on cryptocurrency and cryptography, I learnt new things after going through this lecture.

This is my home work post for task 3

Cc:
@awesononso
@nane15

references
https://steemit.com/hive-108451/@awesononso/steemit-crypto-academy-season-4-beginners-course-task-3-the-genesis-block
https://www.edureka.co/blog/what-is-cryptography/
https://www.coinbase.com/learn/crypto-basics/what-is-cryptocurrency
https://www.cloudwards.net/description-of-encryption/