After suggesting it was halting support for the virtual currency, Microsoft has said that it will actually continue to support bitcoin moving forward.
Earlier today, we reported that Microsoft was no longer accepting the cryptocurrency bitcoin for its Windows and Windows Mobile Store.
The story was based on an officially launched message on Microsoft's website that simply said in a short text that the “Microsoft Store doesn't accept Bitcoin.”
This seemed a pretty emphatic conclusion, apparently bringing to an end bitcoin as a payment option in the Windows Store, with the message adding:
You can no longer redeem Bitcoin into your Microsoft account. Existing balances in your account will still be available for purchases from Microsoft Store, but can't be refunded.
As we said, emphatic. However, it seems that Microsoft's wording was confusing enough for most outlets to report that the currency support had been halted, even though that is not actually the case. Redmond reached out to the guys at VentureBeat to clarify the situation, confirming that bitcoin is still supported on the Windows Store:
We continue to support Bitcoin for adding money to your Microsoft Account which can be used for purchasing content in the Windows and Xbox stores … We apologize for inaccurate information that was inadvertently posted to a Microsoft site, which is currently being corrected.
The company offered no reasons for why the original message was posted (it has since been removed), but it definitely seems that it was a mistake.
There is no hard data to show how popular the curreny is as a payment method on the Windows Store, but it seems reasonable to assume it is not a significant number compared to other methods. That said, Microsoft has been accepting this payment option since December 2014, and after a bit of confusion today, nothing has changed.
SOURCE: VentureBeat
