I believe you’ve heard of Blockchain technology and its applications, and you’ve searched the internet for articles or videos explaining how it works.
Now that you understand it, you’re curious about how this sort of technology may be used in everyday life. We’ll examine some examples, although first, a brief explanation of the concept of a blockchain.
In layman’s words, it’s a distributed database that anyone can obtain a copy of. Anyone with a copy of the information inside it can add fresh data but cannot modify existing ones.
This characteristic makes blockchain ideal for transparently recording data because everyone can see what’s in it. You may want to learn the benefits contactless payment.
Blockchain Technology and Its Applications
So, in this essay, I’ll show you six different applications of blockchain technology. Let us begin with the most obvious and popular one, which is:
6. Cryptocurrencies.
When Bitcoin was introduced in 2008, it enabled people to transact directly with one another without relying on third parties such as banks. Since then, approximately 1600 cryptocurrencies have been established. But let us go beyond cryptocurrency.
Satoshi Nakamoto invented Blockchain in 2009 to act as a major component of Bitcoin, supporting peer-to-peer transmission by connecting blocks with hash pointers to the prior block and processed information.
5. Blockchain Applications on Cars
Consider how blockchain technology can be applied to cars. Have you ever heard of odometer fraud? Through tampering with a vehicle’s odometer, somebody may render an automobile clean instead of worn out, forcing people to pay higher prices than it truly valued.
The government attempts to address this by gathering vehicle mileage when they undergo a safety inspection, but this is insufficient.
Rather, you could substitute typical odometers using smart units that are linked to the internet as well as periodically record the automobile’s mileage on a ledger called a blockchain.
This might generate a reliable electronic certificate for every automobile. Thus since we employ blockchain technology, nobody can mess with what is stored, and anyone may verify a car’s past.
Bosch’s IoT lab has begun working on it, and at present it’s being tested across a fleet of one hundred automobiles in Germany and Switzerland. So blockchains are excellent for keeping track of items over time.
4. Blockchain Applications on Intellectual Property
In addition to odometers, it can track intellectual property, and patents, and even serve as a notary. However, we could also utilize a blockchain for this!
Stampd.io, for example, allows you to submit documents to the Bitcoin or Ethereum blockchains. Once included, you can always verify that you created a document at a specific point in time, similar to a notary, though blockchains are not currently on the same legal level as notaries.
3. Digital Voting
Another fascinating application is computerized voting. Currently, casting occurs using papers or via customized computers operating exclusive software. Voting on paper is expensive, and electronic voting may also have security difficulties.
In recent years, we’ve even seen countries abandon digital voting in favor of paper ballots because they are concerned that electronic votes would be tampered with and manipulated by hackers.
However, rather than paper, we might utilize blockchains to record as well as save votes. Such a system would be exceedingly transparent because everyone could check the voting total for themselves, and interfering with it would be extremely impossible.
The Swiss business Agora is already working on such a system, which will be open source. But there are numerous problems.
First, you must be able to identify voters while respecting their privacy. Second, if you let individuals vote using their computers or phones, you must consider the possibility that such devices are infected with malware designed to meddle with the voting process.
Finally, a system like this must be able to withstand denial-of-service attacks, which could render it worthless. It’s certainly an obstacle to break apart, although once it is achieved, it may lead to a better accountable and efficient voting process.
2. Food Industry
Companies might utilize blockchain technology to monitor their packaged food from the time they are collected or processed to when it gets to the customers.
According to statistics, nearly half a million people (420,000) die each year as a result of food-borne infections, which is due in part to the time it takes to isolate the contaminated food.
Blockchain technology might allow us to develop electronic certificates for every bit of food, showing the place it originated and to whom it has to be delivered.
So, if a contamination is identified, we can track it down to its source and immediately alert those who purchased the same batch of defective food.
Walmart and IBM are currently developing such a system. It enabled their experts to trace the source of a package of mangoes in around two seconds, as opposed to several weeks via a typical approach.
A method like this might be used in other sectors as well. We could use it to track normal products and combat counterfeit goods by letting anyone confirm whether or not the thing is from the manufacturer.
1. Track of packaging and shipments
Another option is to track packages and shipments using a blockchain. IBM and container shipping giant Maersk are developing a decentralized ledger to help make global commerce of goods more efficient.
So far, we’ve looked at how blockchains can be used to track and verify data integrity. However, when smart contracts are added to blockchains, they become even more powerful. These contracts are tiny computer programs that exist on the blockchain and can take action when specific criteria are met.
Alternatively, they may allow us to only pay for auto insurance when we drive. But it goes even beyond.
Smart contracts allow us to secure our data on the blockchain. They could also allow an individual to keep the hospital data on a blockchain as well as only grant doctors accessibility when we approve them via a biometric fingerprint. Similarly, you might save your identification there and pick which data to reveal.
Ordering alcohol in a bar, for instance, requires simply proof that you are over the legal drinking age, which you may provide via smart contracts without disclosing anything else, or consider collecting royalties for artists.
A future streaming service may put up two smart contracts: one where consumers send their monthly subscription and one that tracks what they’ve listened to.
Towards the conclusion of every month, the electronic contract that collects the membership fee will autonomously divide the funds among composers according to the number of times their tracks were streamed.
Conclusion
In summary, blockchain technology can be used in a variety of ways. This article is only a brief overview of how it can be used, and it is by no means a complete list of all applications.
Because there is so much going on in this space, it would take a very long time to write. Please let me know in the comments below what your favorite application is.