Internet Archive Adds Bitcoin Cash, Zcash to Donation Options

The Internet Archive, the digital library of internet artifacts and webpages, has added new cryptocurrency payment options for supporters wanting to help keep their servers running.

In a blog post published Thursday, the non-profit host of the Wayback Machine – a service which takes snapshots of webpages as they evolve through time – announced it will now accept donations in bitcoin cash and zcash.

Donating to the archive will allow it to fulfill its mission of ensuring the internet is "free, secure and backed up for all time," according to the post.

The organization wrote:

"At the Internet Archive, we are big fans of the cryptocurrency movement and have been trying to do our part to test and support alternative means of commerce."

The Internet Archive has supported bitcoin donations since 2012, noting in a previous post that they have allowed employees to be paid in the cryptocurrency since 2013.

In the same post, the organization said it doesn't cash out its cryptocurrency holdings, but is rather holding them to study how bitcoin can be used to benefit non-profits.

"We want to see how donated bitcoin can be used, not just sold off," it wrote at the time.

The archive says it aims to back up every book, webpage, audio file, TV show and piece of software ever produced, making them freely accessible to anyone on the internet.

Disclosure: CoinDesk is a subsidiary of Digital Currency Group, which has an ownership stake in Zcash Company, the for-profit entity that develops the Zcash protocol.

Internet Archive server image from John Blyberg/Flickr