Bitcoin Continues Plunge After 'Powerful' Attacks

Bitcoin
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The value of Bitcoin continued to plunge on Friday as trading resumed on Mt.Gox, the world's largest virtual currency exchange.

The currency fell to $75 before shooting up to $102 and then fell back down to $95 by 7 a.m. London time.

Bitcoin was valued at around $120 when trading was halted by Mt.Gox for about 12 hours on Thursday, following a substantial drop. The exchange told CNBC.com that increased demand had led to a slowdown with its systems, as well as sporadic distributed denial-of-service attacks (DDoS) - which slow down the website, delay orders and panic sellers.

(Read More: Bitcoin Crash Spurs Race to Create New Exchanges)

"We are suffering from DDoS attacks on a daily basis, but the past few days they were more 'powerful' than the usual," Gonzague Gat-Bouchery, communications manager at Mt.Gox told CNBC.com.

"People are using zombie PCs or [a] hacked server to send a lot of traffic to our servers. And for that there is not many things that can be done," he added.

Bitcoin – dismissed by some as a ponzi scheme and hailed by others as the future of money – has fallen in recent days from the record high of $266 it reached on Wednesday.

(Read More: Bitcoin Bounces Back After Crashing Nearly 60%)

The digital currency is bought and sold on a peer-to-peer network independent of any central control. Users can send money directly from their computers to others across the world; coins can be used to buy real goods, swapped for cash on exchanges or used for speculation.

The currency has gained prominence amid the euro zone sovereign debt crisis as more people started to question the safety of keeping their cash in a bank. Bitcoins shot up in value in March when investors were alarmed at Cyprus' plans to impose losses on bank deposits.