Online Course
Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies
- Provider Coursera
- Cost Free Online Course (Audit)
- Session In progress
- Language English
- Effort 3-6 hours a week
- Duration 11 weeks long
- Learn more about MOOCs
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Overview
Class Central Tips
To really understand what is special about Bitcoin, we need to understand how it works at a technical level. We’ll address the important questions about Bitcoin, such as:
How does Bitcoin work? What makes Bitcoin different? How secure are your Bitcoins? How anonymous are Bitcoin users? What determines the price of Bitcoins? Can cryptocurrencies be regulated? What might the future hold?
After this course, you’ll know everything you need to be able to separate fact from fiction when reading claims about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. You’ll have the conceptual foundations you need to engineer secure software that interacts with the Bitcoin network. And you’ll be able to integrate ideas from Bitcoin in your own projects.
Course Lecturers:
Arvind Narayanan, Princeton University
All the features of this course are available for free. It does not offer a certificate upon completion.
How does Bitcoin work? What makes Bitcoin different? How secure are your Bitcoins? How anonymous are Bitcoin users? What determines the price of Bitcoins? Can cryptocurrencies be regulated? What might the future hold?
After this course, you’ll know everything you need to be able to separate fact from fiction when reading claims about Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies. You’ll have the conceptual foundations you need to engineer secure software that interacts with the Bitcoin network. And you’ll be able to integrate ideas from Bitcoin in your own projects.
Course Lecturers:
Arvind Narayanan, Princeton University
All the features of this course are available for free. It does not offer a certificate upon completion.
Syllabus
Introduction to Crypto and Cryptocurrencies
-Learn about cryptographic building blocks ("primitives") and reason about their security. Work through how these primitives can be used to construct simple cryptocurrencies.
How Bitcoin Achieves Decentralization
-Learn Bitcoin's consensus mechanism and reason about its security. Appreciate how security comes from a combination of technical methods and clever incentive engineering.
Mechanics of Bitcoin
-Learn how the individual components of the Bitcoin protocol make the whole system tick: transactions, script, blocks, and the peer-to-peer network.
How to Store and Use Bitcoins
-This week we'll explore how using Bitcoins works in practice: different ways of storing Bitcoin keys, security measures, and various types of services that allow you to trade and transact with bitcoins.
Bitcoin Mining
-We already know that Bitcoin relies crucially on mining. But who are the miners? How did they get into this? How do they operate? What's the business model like for miners? What impact do they have on the environment?
Bitcoin and Anonymity
-Is Bitcoin anonymous? What does that statement even mean—can we define it rigorously? We'll learn about the various ways to improve Bitcoin's anonymity and privacy and learn about Bitcoin's role in Silk Road and other hidden marketplaces.
Community, Politics, and Regulation
-We'll look at all the ways that the world of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technology touches the world of people. We'll discuss the community, politics within Bitcoin and the way that Bitcoin interacts with politics, and law enforcement and regulation issues.
Alternative Mining Puzzles
-Not everyone is happy about how Bitcoin mining works: its energy consumption and the fact that it requires specialized hardware are major sticking points. This week we'll look at how mining can be re-designed in alternative cryptocurrencies.
Bitcoin as a Platform
-One of the most exciting things about Bitcoin technology is its potential to support applications other than currency. We'll study several of these and study the properties of Bitcoin that makes this possible.
Altcoins and the Cryptocurrency Ecosystem
-Hundreds of altcoins, or alternative cryptocurrencies, have been started, either to fix Bitcoin's perceived flaws or to pursue different goals and properties. We'll look at everything that goes into an altcoin and how they interact with Bitcoin.
The Future of Bitcoin?
-The use of Bitcoin technology for decentralizing property, markets, and so on has been hailed as a recipe for economic and political disruption. We'll look at the technological underpinnings of these proposals and the potential impact on society.
-Learn about cryptographic building blocks ("primitives") and reason about their security. Work through how these primitives can be used to construct simple cryptocurrencies.
How Bitcoin Achieves Decentralization
-Learn Bitcoin's consensus mechanism and reason about its security. Appreciate how security comes from a combination of technical methods and clever incentive engineering.
Mechanics of Bitcoin
-Learn how the individual components of the Bitcoin protocol make the whole system tick: transactions, script, blocks, and the peer-to-peer network.
How to Store and Use Bitcoins
-This week we'll explore how using Bitcoins works in practice: different ways of storing Bitcoin keys, security measures, and various types of services that allow you to trade and transact with bitcoins.
Bitcoin Mining
-We already know that Bitcoin relies crucially on mining. But who are the miners? How did they get into this? How do they operate? What's the business model like for miners? What impact do they have on the environment?
Bitcoin and Anonymity
-Is Bitcoin anonymous? What does that statement even mean—can we define it rigorously? We'll learn about the various ways to improve Bitcoin's anonymity and privacy and learn about Bitcoin's role in Silk Road and other hidden marketplaces.
Community, Politics, and Regulation
-We'll look at all the ways that the world of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency technology touches the world of people. We'll discuss the community, politics within Bitcoin and the way that Bitcoin interacts with politics, and law enforcement and regulation issues.
Alternative Mining Puzzles
-Not everyone is happy about how Bitcoin mining works: its energy consumption and the fact that it requires specialized hardware are major sticking points. This week we'll look at how mining can be re-designed in alternative cryptocurrencies.
Bitcoin as a Platform
-One of the most exciting things about Bitcoin technology is its potential to support applications other than currency. We'll study several of these and study the properties of Bitcoin that makes this possible.
Altcoins and the Cryptocurrency Ecosystem
-Hundreds of altcoins, or alternative cryptocurrencies, have been started, either to fix Bitcoin's perceived flaws or to pursue different goals and properties. We'll look at everything that goes into an altcoin and how they interact with Bitcoin.
The Future of Bitcoin?
-The use of Bitcoin technology for decentralizing property, markets, and so on has been hailed as a recipe for economic and political disruption. We'll look at the technological underpinnings of these proposals and the potential impact on society.
Taught by
Arvind Narayanan
Class Central Charts
- #2 in Subjects / Cybersecurity / Cryptography
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Reviews for Coursera's Bitcoin and Cryptocurrency Technologies Based on 17 reviews
- 5 stars 59%
- 4 stars 24%
- 3 stars 12%
- 2 star 0%
- 1 star 6%
Did you take this course? Share your experience with other students.
Write a review- 1
Joseph
completed this course.
This course contains scientific errors, and the cryptocurrency sector is suffering very much from such sloppy research and a poor understanding of certain aspects of computation which will become increasingly relevant in the future.
In the section, "Energy consumption and ecology", the authors claim that since SHA-256 is a non-reversible computation, Bitcoin mining must consume a minimum amount of energy due to Landauer's limit. This is false.
To give you some background, Landauer's principle states that in order to delete information by replacing that information wit…
In the section, "Energy consumption and ecology", the authors claim that since SHA-256 is a non-reversible computation, Bitcoin mining must consume a minimum amount of energy due to Landauer's limit. This is false.
To give you some background, Landauer's principle states that in order to delete information by replacing that information wit…
Was this review helpful to you?
Yes
Yudhanjaya W
by
Yudhanjaya
completed this course, spending 4 hours a week on it and found the course difficulty to be medium.
Thorough in content and very well structured, this course takes you from the basics of cryptography to a sweeping overview of how Bitcoin and cyptocurrencies work, their ecosystems, impact, political effects, ramifications, potential and more.
I personally found it an excellent balance of theory and code. Only once did I need to do any research outside the course itself to fully understand something - and that was for merkel trees. While some of the lecturers do not look like they're used to presenting in front of a camera, their content is nevertheless lucid and more.
Some level of CS knowledge is required. I found a basic idea of how P2P networks operate, a basic idea of encryption and some idea of GPU processing to be needed. Note that you do not get a Coursera certificate for this course.
I personally found it an excellent balance of theory and code. Only once did I need to do any research outside the course itself to fully understand something - and that was for merkel trees. While some of the lecturers do not look like they're used to presenting in front of a camera, their content is nevertheless lucid and more.
Some level of CS knowledge is required. I found a basic idea of how P2P networks operate, a basic idea of encryption and some idea of GPU processing to be needed. Note that you do not get a Coursera certificate for this course.
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Anonymous
Anonymous
completed this course.
Excellent course.
Cleanly separates the different pieces that go into making bitcoin, and explains each of them simply and clearly. Covers not only bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, but also the wider implications and applications of the blockchain to non-currency applications.
Highly recommended for anyone interested in bitcoin or the blockchain.
Cleanly separates the different pieces that go into making bitcoin, and explains each of them simply and clearly. Covers not only bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, but also the wider implications and applications of the blockchain to non-currency applications.
Highly recommended for anyone interested in bitcoin or the blockchain.
17
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Aliaksandr B
by
Aliaksandr
completed this course, spending 2 hours a week on it and found the course difficulty to be medium.
Very interesting course explaining cryptocurrencies in different aspects. Highly recommended to anyone interested in bitcoins, cryptocurrencies or just normal currencies as well.
As mentioned in other comments, please, note you will not have any types of homework and will not get any statement of accomplishment.
As mentioned in other comments, please, note you will not have any types of homework and will not get any statement of accomplishment.
11
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Omer M
by
Omer
completed this course, spending 2 hours a week on it and found the course difficulty to be medium.
This was a very informative course , Will diffidently help as a first solid step into Cryptocurrency world.
However, they should state that this course required a programming background for submitting the assignments .
However, they should state that this course required a programming background for submitting the assignments .
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Anonymous
Anonymous
is taking this course right now.
With the recent rise in prices of bitcoins, it is exciting for me to earn free bitcoins from kloviaclinks. com tools
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