Recently, more and more people are interested in cryptocurrencies. And if earlier such interest was caused primarily by the desire to preserve and increase personal savings, this year the increased attention of citizens to this area was caused by the great migration of best cloud mining, which provoked power outages in a number of regions.

What are cryptocurrencies and why are they called that?

Cryptocurrencies are virtual digital money that cannot be stored like coins or banknotes. They exist and function on the basis of computer developments, in particular, cryptographic encryption. Reliable protection, confidentiality of owners and at the same time transparency of cryptocurrencies and all their transactions are provided by the so-called blockchain technologies. They build all incoming information into data chains that cannot be deleted or changed locally without affecting subsequent links.

What equipment is required to acquire, store bitcoins and perform other operations with them

You can buy cryptocurrencies on crypto exchanges. If we are talking about mining, cryptocurrency mining, then two types of equipment are used for this. The first is ASIC devices (application-specific integrated circuits) created exclusively for cryptocurrency mining. The second is the video cards used in the stuffing of computers.

What are the main risks and types of fraud in this area

All cryptocurrencies are based on cryptography, as well as blockchain technology, which provides transparency and interconnection between all blocks, elements of a cryptocurrency. That is, if you decide to fake bitcoin, then at the time of sending, other validators that own bitcoin will refute your transaction, since this bitcoin is fake.

Stealing bitcoin is real if they know the passwords and keys to your account on crypto exchanges. In addition, the phishing method is quite popular: they fake the site, and you enter your logins and passwords, which are stolen by scammers and gain access to your wallet. Some skilled scammers fake celebrity accounts and collect cryptocurrency from the audience, ostensibly to double it. So, recently someone created a fake Elon Musk account on Facebook, this account received a verification badge and called for sending bitcoins to his wallet.