What is mining?
To understand what mining is, it is necessary to know that digital currencies represent a complex code that cannot be altered. This is because the transactions carried out with them are protected by a cryptographic system.
As there is no central authority overseeing these transactions, a group of people must validate and record them. To do this, these users utilize their computers, recording these transactions on the blockchain. The blockchain is a massive record of transactions. It is a public database that contains the history of all operations carried out with each unit of Bitcoin (other digital currencies are based on this same technology). Each new transaction is verified against the blockchain to ensure that the same Bitcoins have not been previously used by another person.
The miners are the ones who record transactions on the blockchain. They offer the processing power of their computers to carry out these records and verify the operations made with the currencies – in return, they receive new units of these currencies as compensation.
Bitcoins are created as the thousands of computers that form this network manage to solve complex mathematical problems that verify the validity of the transactions included in the blockchain.
In other words, mining represents the creation of new units of some types of digital currencies. If more computers are used to increase the processing capacity aimed at mining, the mathematical problems that need to be solved become more difficult. This happens precisely to limit the mining process.