Stefan Mileschin

Cyber currency Bitcoin is being walloped by attacks from unknown computer hackers who are sending "mutated" lines of code into the program that runs the virtual currency.

So far, the attacks have caused major headaches for the two Bitcoin exchanges that caused them to temporarily halt withdrawals by customers who stored bitcoins in digital wallets provided by the exchanges

According to a spokesperson for the Bitcoin Foundation, it appeared to be a denial-of-service attack.

"Whoever is doing this is not stealing coins, but is succeeding in preventing some transactions from confirming. The DoS attacks do not affect people's bitcoin wallets or funds."

The spokesman said a team of core software developers who focus on Bitcoin were working to fix the problem, but until it was solved some users would not be able to do anything with their Bitcoins, and the affected funds would appear to be "tied up" in transactions.

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