By
Godfrey Benjamin
January 9th, 2024
Bitcoin processing company BitPay introduced its updated API service, enabling to make refunds to any bitcoin address.
US bitcoin processing company BitPay announced on Thursday that it has launched a new version of representational state transfer (RESTful) service that is using its decentralized authentication tool BitAuth.
The cryptographically-secure API will enable users to implement bitcoin refunds from their applications to any address as it utilizes Bitcoin Payment Protocol. This means it is compatible with all bitcoin wallets.
Eric Martindale from BitPay wrote in its blog: “[The refund API] will allow all of our customers to initiate the refund process from within their applications, which we hope will lead to more smooth Bitcoin payment experiences for everyone, regardless of platform or wallet.”
The API follows other releases for developers from a number of major bitcoin companies. Thus, Coinbase and CEX.io presented new offerings last week.
BitPay was targeted at making the service convenient for the customers of all API-using developers, who will now be able to interact with merchants like the users of other payment methods.
Martindale noted the firm’s main goal was to ensure transactions security and raise the amount of available resources in its API.
BitPay also updated its Billing API to allow companies automate the submission of bills and request future payments.
The company states: “Our primary goal with this new API implementation was to cryptographically secure interactions with BitPay, whether they be the processing of payments or updating of account information. Ideally, this security would be independent of that of SSL/TLS – that is, even if SSL were to be compromised, API requests could still be secured.”
Notably, the service will secure interactions through tokenization. Martindale explained: “Tokens can be restricted to an identity, requiring a signature by that identity to utilize, or even a list of identities – perhaps a group of devices (such as point of sale tablets) or a list of people and their keys.”
In comparison with BitPay tokenization, Apple uses similar security methods for its new product Apple Pay, which was released last week.
BitPay described the release as one that provides developers with the ability to interface with its API in new creative ways.
New API is built on top of Bitcore, an open-source Javascript library released in February. Contributors to Bitcore have developed a number of projects on this technology. BitPay encouraged others to take advantage of this while creating their own projects.
The company ended the post by saying: “We look forward to seeing what you build.”
BitPay pointed out that using the new API “should feel very familiar” and that it should also “exhibit extremely predictable behavior.”