Dogecoin address prefixes

This simple process — signing a transaction, verifying the signature — is more or less everything a cryptocurrency transaction does. But Bitcoin has more advanced addresses: This abbreviation stands for "Pay to Script Hash. This kind of addresses enable more flexible methods to verify yourself, for example, those that are used in multisig-addresses, in which two parties provide information which sums up to the needed script.

These addresses use the prefix 05, which is the reason why they start with a "3". However, it needs another guide to completely describe the magic of P2SH addresses. Here we focus on addresses itself and leave Bitcoin to have a look, how other cryptocurrencies create addresses. A lot of cryptocurrencies use nearly the same address format as Bitcoin. For example, Litecoin, Dash, and Dogecoin deploy the same cryptographic procedures to generate an address: As these coins use the same cryptographic algorithm, you can use the same private and public keys to save coins in all these cryptocurrencies.

Partly you can even store them on the same addresses. For example, Litecoin and Bitcoin use the same prefix for P2SH addresses — 05 — so that it is possible to store both Bitcoin as Litecoin at the same address. Other cryptocurrencies, however, use other schemes to generate the address.

For example, Monero is based on the Cryptonote algorithm. This algorithm deploys another cryptographic signature algorithm to generate the public key, EdDSA. Cryptonote currencies have so-called ring signatures, which provide more privacy, as you can't determine which key a transaction was signed.

For this reason, Cryptonote addresses must contain two public keys, a view, and a spend key. Like with Bitcoin addresses, Cryptonote adds a prefix byte and hashes the result. However, it uses Keccak instead of double SHA to generate four checksum bytes, which are added at the end of the string. After converting the result to base58, you get the final address, which is longer than in Bitcoin.

It looks like this: This variety of addresses demonstrates, again, that addresses are just a mean to accept a payment which is assigned to a certain public key. For this base function, it does not matter what you do with the public key, what cryptographic algorithm you apply to convert it to an address, and how the address looks.

The building procedure of an address, however, can have an important implication on security, privacy, and usability. Without the checksum integration, Bitcoin address could be mistyped, and without the integration of the view key in the address, Monero would be not as private as it is. A look at Ethereum's addresses further establishes this insight.

Like many things in cryptocurrency, the topic of addresses starts to get really intriguing when it comes to Ethereum. Technically, Ethereum's address generation is similar to Bitcoin's, but does not take the whole way. Like we know from Bitcoin. Then you hash this key with Keccak The result is a byte string.

The first 12 of these bytes are dropped, the remaining 20 bytes are a 40 character address, to which usually the prefix 0x is added. Other than Bitcoin or Cryptonote, Ethereum does not transform the address to base58, so it is in hexadecimal 0-F. Another difference between Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies is that Ethereum addresses have no checksum.

Any hexadecimal 40 character string can be an Ethereum address, which is the reason why Ethereum developers heavily dissuade users to manually type such an address, as a single typing error can result in the loss of funds.

Compared with the addresses of other cryptocurrencies, Ethereum addresses seem to be unfinished, gross and recklessly dangerous for the user. For a cryptocurrency which has the second largest market value and is promoted as the most innovative cryptocurrency at all, this seems to be surprisingly low level.

What we today use as addresses were never intended to be permanently used as such. From the beginning, Ethereum developers aim to build a smart contract based name register, with which payments can be easily sent to names or domains and so on. In the long term, with Ethereum, cryptocurrency can close the circle and come back to the easy to use payment Satoshi intended when implementing Pay to IP. However, as Jeff Coleman points out , there is another, a maybe more important reason that Ethereum does not use crafted addresses like Bitcoin: The developers think it can be done better.

Remember, an address is just a cryptographic method to represent the needed information to assign funds to a private key. This can be done with contracts that assign this information to names, but this can also be done with more sophisticated address formats than Bitcoin uses. It consists of 32 case insensitive alphanumeric characters, containing a country code, a checksum, the bank number as well as the account number.

ICAP uses an XE as a country identifier and string of 16 to 30 alphanumerical characters which includes information like account, asset, checksum or institution. In the long run, Ethereum addresses could become memorable and compatible with the existing banking system.

The support for ICAP addresses is currently growing. The usual clients already enable the generation of ICAP addresses, but still, use the legacy address as a standard. To make this more secure, Vitalik Buterin developed a little improvement to add checksums in the form of capitalization.

With EIP55 generated addresses , upper cases serve as a checksum. So if an address has at least one capital letter, it will be invalid, if you make a typing error. It is interlinked with the social platform Steemit, where users can "mine" Steem-coins by collecting upvotes for posts.

This "subjective proof of work" is a clever combination of Proof of Stake and Proof of Work. There seem to be no other wallets available. Then it adds the bytes 00 as a prefix in the beginning of the resulting string — this is the reason why P2PKH addresses start with a "1" — and four checksum-bytes at the end.

The four checksum bytes are generated by hashing the result twice with SHA and taking the first four bytes. Then your wallet converts the result into a base58 string. Whenever you paste an address in your Bitcoin wallet, it checks the prefix and calculates the checksum.

This makes it impossible to send funds to a wrong address due to a typing error. If you have the private key for an address, only you can sign a transaction with cryptocurrency token assigned to this address — while everybody who knows your address can verify the validity of your signature.

A lot of cryptocurrencies use nearly the same address format as Bitcoin. For example, Litecoin, Dash, and Dogecoin deploy the same cryptographic procedures to generate an address: As these coins use the same cryptographic algorithm, you can use the same private and public keys to save coins in all these cryptocurrencies.

This algorithm deploys another cryptographic signature algorithm to generate the public key, EdDSA. Cryptonote currencies have so-called ring signatures, which provide more privacy, as you can't determine which key a transaction was signed. For this reason, Cryptonote addresses must contain two public keys, a view, and a spend key.

Like with Bitcoin addresses, Cryptonote adds a prefix byte and hashes the result. However, it uses Keccak instead of double SHA to generate four checksum bytes, which are added at the end of the string. After converting the result to base58, you get the final address, which is longer than in Bitcoin. It looks like this: This variety of addresses demonstrates, again, that addresses are just a mean to accept a payment which is assigned to a certain public key.

For this base function, it does not matter what you do with the public key, what cryptographic algorithm you apply to convert it to an address, and how the address looks. The building procedure of an address, however, can have an important implication on security, privacy, and usability. Without the checksum integration, Bitcoin address could be mistyped, and without the integration of the view key in the address, Monero would be not as private as it is.

A look at Ethereum's addresses further establishes this insight. Like many things in cryptocurrency, the topic of addresses starts to get really intriguing when it comes to Ethereum. Technically, Ethereum's address generation is similar to Bitcoin's, but does not take the whole way. Like we know from Bitcoin. Then you hash this key with Keccak The result is a byte string. The first 12 of these bytes are dropped, the remaining 20 bytes are a 40 character address, to which usually the prefix 0x is added.

Other than Bitcoin or Cryptonote, Ethereum does not transform the address to base58, so it is in hexadecimal 0-F. Another difference between Ethereum and other cryptocurrencies is that Ethereum addresses have no checksum. Any hexadecimal 40 character string can be an Ethereum address, which is the reason why Ethereum developers heavily dissuade users to manually type such an address, as a single typing error can result in the loss of funds. Compared with the addresses of other cryptocurrencies, Ethereum addresses seem to be unfinished, gross and recklessly dangerous for the user.

For a cryptocurrency which has the second largest market value and is promoted as the most innovative cryptocurrency at all, this seems to be surprisingly low level. What we today use as addresses were never intended to be permanently used as such.

From the beginning, Ethereum developers aim to build a smart contract based name register, with which payments can be easily sent to names or domains and so on.

In the long term, with Ethereum, cryptocurrency can close the circle and come back to the easy to use payment Satoshi intended when implementing Pay to IP. However, as Jeff Coleman points out , there is another, a maybe more important reason that Ethereum does not use crafted addresses like Bitcoin: The developers think it can be done better. Remember, an address is just a cryptographic method to represent the needed information to assign funds to a private key. This can be done with contracts that assign this information to names, but this can also be done with more sophisticated address formats than Bitcoin uses.

It consists of 32 case insensitive alphanumeric characters, containing a country code, a checksum, the bank number as well as the account number. ICAP uses an XE as a country identifier and string of 16 to 30 alphanumerical characters which includes information like account, asset, checksum or institution.

In the long run, Ethereum addresses could become memorable and compatible with the existing banking system. The support for ICAP addresses is currently growing. The usual clients already enable the generation of ICAP addresses, but still, use the legacy address as a standard.