A few years ago, the crypto market was shocked by the news that car manufacturer Tesla bitcoin (BTC) was accepted as a means of payment. Still, over concerns about the energy consumption of the network, Tesla decided to use bitcoin later no longer accepted as a means of payment. According to rumors that have arisen on Twitter, this seems to be about to change, although the authenticity of these rumors seems to be highly doubtful.
Tesla and bitcoin
A user on Twitter discovered in his own words behind the scenes of Tesla’s website certain features related to payment. Bitcoin can be found here in the source code, and is neatly placed between, for example, Apple Pay and PayPal. This, according to many, was reason enough to believe that Tesla will soon give the green light to paying with BTC again. Incidentally, dogecoin was also found in the source code.
However, it soon became clear that the mention of bitcoin and dogecoin had been seen behind the scenes of Tesla’s website since at least January of this year. So there is certainly no question of a new development, and the hype that arose on social media was probably completely unfounded. Tesla simply never removed bitcoin and dogecoin from the source code.
Rumors turn out to be premature
Crypto journalist Colin Wu shared his, for many people disappointing, findings about the rumors on Twitter:
“There were rumors in the community that Tesla added Bitcoin and Dogecoin to the source code of its payment page. However, verification revealed that both cryptocurrencies were present in the source code as early as January 2023. It seems that Tesla did not remove this code when they previously discontinued the option to pay with Bitcoin.”
There were rumors in the community that Tesla added Bitcoin and Dogecoin to its payment page source code. However, upon verification, it was found that Bitcoin and Dogecoin were already present in the source code as early as January 2023. It appears that Tesla did not remove this… pic.twitter.com/CATEWPmnVn
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) July 20, 2023
Today’s rumors turn out to be nothing more than rumors. There is currently nothing to indicate that Tesla is about to start accepting bitcoin and/or dogecoin as a means of payment again. Still, it can be seen as a bright spot that the IT department at Tesla has never removed bitcoin and dogecoin from the source code of the website.