CS 531 Information System Planning
Assignment – 1
Summary of an Article
What is Bitcoin and what are the impacts on Businesses?
2014 Winter
What is Bitcoin and what are the impacts on Businesses?
Bitcoin is a new kind of money, but not real money. It is also known electronic currency. That is not controlled by a single organization or government. It is kind of open source project, it is used by more than 100.000 people and these numbers are increasing day by day. Bitcoins came into the market in 2009, it was around $7.50, but now it is almost $1.300 per bitcoin. The reason why some people prefer bitcoin is there is no middle man, which means no any bank or government between peer to peer transactions.
There are no transaction fees and even you do not have to give your name. Many companies or small businesses start to accept them. They invest their money on bitcoins because every day rates are increasing, no transaction fee, no credit card fee, they can transfer money between countries, no rules. In addition, international payments are easy and cheap because of bitcoins are not tied up to any country regulations.
Bitcoins are as mentioned before kind of electronic currency and you can hold them in your personal computer’s hard drive or in the cloud. Both ways are not %100 secure. If you once delete bitcoins from your hard drive, you will not be able to get them back or if a hacker access your account in the cloud and if he steals your bitcoins, you will not be able to get them back. There is no any insurance for your bitcoins. But, bank accounts are already insured by FDIC, which means even someone steals your money, you can get your money back.
Beside insurance concerns, there are also some other disadvantages, I have read a lot of article about bitcoins and most of writers and authors are concerning about illegal use. They say, many drug dealers use bitcoins for trading drugs. Many writers worry about...