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I was looking thru Block explorer at an address with a balance. It has never been spent from thus the public key is unknown. If the public key is unknown, how can Block explorer calculate the hash160 of the public key?
How is hash160 calculated from an unseen public key?
Answers
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Because an address is the Hash160 (=RIPEMD160(SHA256(x))) of the public key. The transaction output lists that 160-bit hash directly.
When redeeming such an output, you provide both the public key (which must hash to the value given in the output) and a signature (which must be valid for the given public key).
i'm used to seeing hash algos referred to as SHA256 or RIPEMD. what is Hash160? – joe – 2013-03-08T04:02:42.487
1@joe
Hash160 = RIPEMD160(SHA256(m))(note that plain RIPEMD is a different, broken hash and bitcoin doesn't use it) – CodesInChaos – 2013-03-08T11:19:29.2633Edited. In Bitcoin-speak, Hash(x) = SHA256(SHA256(x)) and Hash160(x) = RIPEMD160(SHA256(x)). – Pieter Wuille – 2013-03-10T16:13:58.360
as a related question, what is really stored in a wallet in regards to keys? just the priv keys or priv keys and pub keys? i ask since the pub keys can be derived from the priv keys. – joe – 2013-03-16T15:43:20.610
The Public Key Hash is equivalent to the bitcoin address, without the Base58Check encoding. RIPEMD160(SHA256(PubK)) == Base58.decode(Address) ? – Haddar Macdasi – 2015-03-24T23:27:39.207