While cryptocurrency has only been in operation for the past 11 years, the ideals behind the digital peer-to-peer money system have been around for decades.

In 1982, computer scientist David Chaum was the first known person to discuss the concepts of cryptocurrency. But it wasn't until Halloween day 2008 that Satoshi Nakamoto would publish the original Bitcoin blueprint (known as the whitepaper), which laid out the blueprint for a peer to peer electronic cash system.

Three months later, Nakamoto officially launched the first cryptocurrency when he mined "block 0," which created the first blockchain. Nakamoto continued to work on the development of Bitcoin until 2011 when he stepped away from the project and seemingly vanished from existence.