It is true that 2018 has not been a great year for cryptocurrency prices but when you decouple prices from developments in blockchain technology, blockchain applications themselves have made incredible progress and we are just months away from a complete overhaul of traditional centralized systems in exchange for new decentralized blockchain based ones.
Image Source: Pixabay
When people hear the world blockchain thrown around the most common thing that comes to mind is Bitcoin. But is Bitcoin blockchain? Well Bitcoin is certainly the first mainstream cryptocurrency to utilize a blockchain for wealth preservation and wealth transference but its not what people are referring to when they mention blockchain.
In this article I will review many of the ways blockchain has already been integrated into our world. The development of new and innovative technologies is moving at light-speed and blockchain technology is being incorporated into modern day business applications at an accelerating pace.
One area in which blockchain is being utilized is in cybersecurity as companies look to capitalize on the technology to create keyless signature systems with the capability of securing health records.
A company called Guardtime is looking to accomplish this task currently to secure the health records of one million Estonian citizens. Securing extremely sensitive information in a decentralized manner has many benefits and allow health care providers to reduce costs by saving them time and expense.
Another company called REMME is basically a decentralized authentication system which is making a sincere effort to replace logins and passwords with SSL certificates stored on a blockchain.
These are just a few of the many ways blockchain is being applied to cybersecurity with many exciting new ventures sure to be just around the corner as we make our way towards Q4 of 2018!
A recent article published by CoinTelegraph entitled 'Standard Chartered, Siemens Partner on Blockchain Pilot to ‘Fully Digitize’ Bank Guarantees' sparked my interest and as it fully supports the thesis of this article I thought I'd share a few interesting points mentioned and touch upon them.
Basically the famous UK multinational banking and financial services company, Standard Chartered (SC) plans to unleash a blockchain pilot for bank guarantees using R3 Corda blockchain technology.
This points out a fact that I've long believed, essentially money as we know it will no longer exist in its current digital format but rather be converted to a digital format existing on a blockchain resulting in increased transparency and interoperability across other blockchains.
In partnership with Siemens’ financing arm Siemens Financial Services (SFS) and trade finance platform TradeIX, the pilot program has been operating since March and is expected to be completed by the end of 2018.
Industry experts hope this new move will “digitize trade and leverage real-time data to deliver efficiency gains and transform the way trade finance is conducted,” or at least thats how Samuel Mathew described it.
“The future of trade is going to be all about data,” Mathew added.
Bank guarantees are traditionally a highly “paper-intensive” area, the parties state in the release, with the industry first blockchain solution designed to significantly streamline current practices by “fully digiti[zing] the process, from initiation of the bank guarantee to the claim handling.”
“We believe that global trade is at the cusp of multi-level digital transformation which will revolutionise the entire business and operating model,” TradeIX CEO Rob Barnes continued.
If this isn't progress tell me what is? I know that blockchain, AI and robotics will all play a role in the future and its not a matter of approving of it but rather understanding it so we will be prepared to take a stand one way or another as these new systems roll out.
Another industry which is being transformed by blockchain technology may come to you as no surprise. I'm talking about the financial services industry.
One project I think shows a lot of potential is called Bank Hapoalim. It is essentially a collaboration between the Israeli bank and Microsoft. The project aims to create a blockchain system for managing bank guarantees.
Soon we will be seeing investors looking for blockchain exposure in the stock market. This will be an interesting opportunity to cash in on the new and emerging technology while limiting the potential volatility of investments when compared to cryptocurrency markets.
Another interesting project has been launched by a company called Maersk. Traditionally their business has been described as a shipping and transport consortium but they have recently unveiled plans to launch a blockchain solution for streamlining marine insurance.
The final topic I would like to discuss revolves around how blockchain technology is transforming manufacturing and industrial distribution systems.
One company called Provenance is creating a project to provide a blockchain-based provenance record of transparency within supply chains. This will make it possible to track a product all the way from its raw material inputs to the final consumer and be aware of a product's journey from a to z.
Image Source: Julius Silver - Creative Commons - Pexels
Another company called Jiocoin is a subsidiary of India's biggest conglomerate, Reliance Industries, is currently developing a blockchain-based supply chain logistics platform that will operate alongside its own cryptocurrency, Jiocoin.
One last really promising project is that of STORJ.io which plans to be the first decentralized provider of distributed and encrypted cloud storage. This will allow users to share unused hard drive space and take a dent into popular paid storage services like Google Drive and Amazon AWS.
So when people talk about blockchain they are not necessarily talking about Bitcoin. They may not be even referring to other cryptocurrencies that operate on blockchains.
They are most likely referring to the underlying technology that allows for decentralized transferrence of information across time and space.
There are many advantages to running a decentralized service as opposed to a centralized one but one of the biggest advantages is free and open access to information with limited risk of corruption.
What do you guys think about the applications discussed in this article? Which fields do you belive blockchain technology will be most successfully implemented in?
Lets get a discussion going about your favorite blockchain projects and how they propose to transform our world!
Thanks for reading.
Authored by: @techblogger
In-text citations sources:
35 Amazing Real World Examples Of How Blockchain Is Changing Our World - Forbes
Standard Chartered, Siemens Partner on Blockchain Pilot to ‘Fully Digitize’ Bank Guarantees - CoinTelegraph
Image Sources: Pexels, Pixabay
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