Which of the following statements is NOT true about Bitcoins?

The statement regarding Bitcoin miners using private key cryptography for encrypting transactions is not true because it misrepresents the role of miners in the Bitcoin network. In the Bitcoin system, miners primarily work with transactions that have already been signed using the sender’s private key. The private key is used by individuals to sign their transactions, ensuring only authorized parties can spend their Bitcoins.

When miners validate transactions, they check that the signatures are valid and that the sender has enough balance. The mining process itself involves solving complex mathematical problems to find a valid hash for the new block, rather than encrypting transactions with their private keys. Thus, miners do not use private key cryptography for encrypting transactions in the way the statement suggests.

In contrast, other statements accurately describe aspects of Bitcoin. For example, Bitcoin does indeed use cryptography to secure transactions and ensure their immutability. Miners play a crucial role in collecting and validating transaction requests, conducting the necessary computations, and adding verified transactions to the blockchain. When they successfully add new blocks of transaction records to the blockchain, miners are rewarded with newly created bitcoins. This reward mechanism is fundamental to the functioning of Bitcoin, as it both incentivizes miners and regulates the issuance of new bitcoins over time.