Surprising Uses Of Blockchain Outside Cryptocurrencies.
Blockchain has the potential to become a cornerstone of global recordkeeping systems, even though it was just introduced ten years ago. Blockchain is a technology for storing data in such a way that it is difficult or impossible to alter, hack, or cheat it.
Blockchain is a sort of distributed ledger technology in which transactions are recorded using a hash, which is an immutable cryptographic signature.
Why is blockchain becoming so popular?
Blockchain is the brainchild of developers who saw faults in the present banking system. They scoffed at the idea that payment validation and settlement could take up to five business days in cross-border transactions. They considered banks acting as third parties and pilfering transaction fees as needless. Real-time transactions (even across borders) are possible with blockchain, and banks are removed from the equation entirely, potentially lowering transaction fees.
At its core, blockchain technology is straightforward to comprehend. The technology consists of a shared database with entries that must be verified and encrypted via peer-to-peer networks.
However, blockchain technology has many more applications than merely serving as fuel for Bitcoin. Below, we’ve listed some of the technology’s emerging uses in other fields.
Processing of Payments
The most obvious application of blockchain technology is to speed up money transfers from one person to another. When banks are removed from the picture, peer-to-peer transactions can be done 24 hours a day, seven days a week, settling transactions in seconds rather than days.
Voting
Countries throughout the world are concerned about voter fraud. States might use blockchain technology to allow citizens to vote digitally while being transparent enough for regulators to identify changes in the network immediately. It would combine the convenience of digital voting with the immutability of blockchain to ensure your vote is counted.
Food Hygiene
Another unexpected application for blockchain is tracing food from its source to your plate. Because blockchain data is unchangeable, you’d be able to track food products from their origin to the grocery store. Furthermore, if a food-borne sickness occurred, blockchain could track the source of contamination much more quickly than it can presently.
See also:Why Is The Crypto Market So Wild? Factors That Move The Crypto Market.
Keeping Medical Records
The medical industry has already begun to transition from paper to digital recordkeeping. Blockchain, on the other hand, offers greater security and ease. Patients would be able to access their files if they had the key, and they would be able to regulate who saw their information in addition to storing them.
Business Supply Chain Management with Blockchain Applications
The immutability of blockchain’s ledger makes it ideal for tasks like real-time tracking of commodities as they move and change hands across the supply chain. For companies carrying these commodities, using a blockchain opens up several possibilities.
Blockchain can be used to line up events in a supply chain, such as allocating products to different shipping containers once they arrive at a port. Blockchain offers a new and dynamic way of organizing and utilizing monitoring data.
See also: Why Bitcoin Is The Future Of Money In Developing Economies.
Healthcare
General information like age and gender, as well as potentially basic medical history data like immunization history or vital signs, are examples of health data ideal for blockchain. None of this data can be used to identify a specific patient on its own, which is why it can be maintained on a shared blockchain that many people can view without causing privacy concerns.
Blockchain can connect specialized medical equipment with a person’s health record as they become more common and increasingly linked to that record. Devices can save and attach data collected on a healthcare blockchain to personal medical records.
Real Estate
Every five to seven years, the average homeowner sells their home, and the average person moves roughly 12 times throughout their lifetime. With so much activity, blockchain might be useful in the real estate industry. It would speed up home sales by immediately confirming financial information, decreasing fraud via encryption, and providing transparency throughout the entire selling and purchase process.
Applications of Blockchain in Government Records Management
Federal, state, and local governments maintain individual data, such as birth and death dates, marital status, and property transactions. However, organizing this data can be problematic, and some of these documents are still only available on paper. Furthermore, residents may be required to physically visit their local government offices to make changes, which is time-consuming, inefficient, and inconvenient. Blockchain technology has the potential to make recordkeeping easier and data more secure.
While blockchain is far from ideal and still has to be developed, there are a plethora of real-world applications for it.
