Category: 4.Beginner’s Guide to Hashing

What is the purpose of hashing? The main purpose of hashing is to verify the integrity of a piece of data. Since the hash generated is UNIQUE to the input data, it acts as a unique “fingerprint” of the input data. This makes a hash useful for verifying the integrity of data sent through insecure communication…

So far, in earlier lessons, you’ve learned what hashing is and how hashing works. But in order to truly understand just what these specialized programs do, it’s helpful to see actual examples in action! Let’s see how the hashing process works using an actual hash function. Since SHA-256 is the chosen hash function of Bitcoin, let’s use it for our example. This is our…

How does hashing work? In the previous lesson, I introduced the concept of hashing and relevant terms. Now, let’s learn how it works! Hashing is a mathematical operation that is easy to perform, but extremely difficult to reverse. The hashing process turns a piece of data into binary code, which is just a bunch of 0s and 1s. Then…

Before diving into the subject of Bitcoin mining, we need to take a quick detour and learn about a certain concept that’s foundational to cryptocurrencies. In order to truly understand how Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies work, it’s crucial to first understand the concept of “hashing“. When you see the word, “hash”, some folks might think…