Microsoft Store Will Not Accept Bitcoin

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Microsoft has announced that its online store will no longer accept cryptocurrency Bitcoin.

The tech giant made the low key announcement via an FAQ update. After a moment in the spotlight, Bitcoin has suffered a dip in popularity and become less of a hot topic.

Microsoft Store Will Not Accept Bitcoin

Microsoft updates FAQs with news

“You can no longer redeem Bitcoin into your Microsoft account. Existing balances in your account will still be available for purchases from Microsoft Store, but can’t be refunded,” says a note in the Microsoft Store FAQ.  There was no announcement on the matter anywhere else on the company site.

However Softpedia spotted that another entry in the FAQ still contains instructions on how to use Bitcoin to add funds to your Microsoft account. The site added support for Bitcoin in December 2014.

At the time the buzz around the cruptocurrency was still fairly intense, even though its value had dropped from its peak of around $1,100. Now interest in the digital currency has dropped off despite some advantages.

Split between two main Bitcoin developers

Bitcoin transactions are validated by miners, which are computers capable of complex calculations, that are then rewarded with new bitcoins. The cryptocurrency has small transaction fees and decentralized systems, but investors have been discouraged due to a steep learning curve and rampant instability.

The most recent Bitcoin news relates to the split between the two top developers. Bitcoin Core still offers the same service as before, whereas Bitcoin Classic has increased the block size limit to 2MB in order to allow more transactions in the same time period.

So far the community is split on which version of bitcoin should be the official version. It is not yet known whether Microsoft has withdrawn Bitcoin support due to this debate. A spokesman has not yet responded to a request for comment.

The cryptocurrency has had a rocky road of late after some commentators predicted that it would become a major global currency. As it turns out the system has been dogged by doubts over security after a series of high-profile hacks, and rampant instability.

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