Mining is the process using which new bitcoins are created by a competitive and decentralized process. Individuals or groups of individuals called miners use freely available special software to solve mathematical problems every 10 minutes to verify and confirm each bitcoin transaction in a block, which is generated based on a system called “hashcash proof-of-work”. Verified blocks are entered into the “blockchain” for others to accept. The first miner to solve the mathematical puzzle will receive new bitcoins as reward. The process is competitive because new bitcoins can be created only at a fixed rate. As of now, a miner gets a reward of 25 bitcoins for verifying each block. More miners in the network, more difficult it is to turn a profit. More number of transaction or blocks, more time it takes to confirm them. Currently, a single bitcoin can be only of 1 MB size and some developers are of the view that scaling this to a larger size could help expand bitcoin. However, some oppose increasing the size as that could reduce reward for smaller miners. And bitcoin mining is an expensive process requiring high processor speeds, time and intensive use of electricity. Commercial bitcoin mining farms are located in China, Iceland, Georgia and the U.S.