Blockchain is already shaking things up…

Blockchain is either the first or second most popular phrase these days when discussing Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning and it is surprising how few actually know about the technology itself, let alone the applications that it has for business.  To explain the technology, Blockchain is a series of transactions or records on a ledger.  Which might sound simple enough and not exactly revolutionary, but in the case of blockchain technology, the ledger is both encrypted and shared (or distributed) across a set of peers or networks.  As records are created, added, maintained or deleted they include the typical information of a ledger in the encrypted format and then added to the chain across the shared versions.  Its the sharing aspect that adds more security as there is no single point of control on the blockchain and a single point of failure.  The capability of corrupting the blockchain would take considerable computing power as it would need to infiltrate the entire network rather than a single point.

If they are not already, then government agencies should be throwing themselves at Blockchain for the vast number of applications it has for them.  Particularly when considering the need to transfer and manage sensitive data regarding their relative public sectors.  Imagine not requiring property title insurance (try this web-site to get the best one) because secure blockchain records can maintain a chronology of every aspect of the title in the form of a crypto ledger.  The same distributed ledger technology can be used in almost any area of government for health records, accounts, local government and even voting polls which can include instantly auditable records for live voting results.

Insurance companies have great potential to use blockchain in their businesses, particularly when moving money overseas, paying for claims and keeping records and their own data.  They can use the technology in either a private or public blockchain which would depend on the business case.  They can use it where multiple parties share and update data, require verification and trust between the parties, where intermediaries add costs (two insurers already are building blockchain for their intermediated businesses which will be launched in 2018), where the interactions are time sensitive and when the transactions depend on each other.  These scenarios occur in almost every facet of insurance and will most certainly be the chosen method of the future Peer to Peer insurance models that we see emerging already.

Blockchain is going to have a significant impact on the agricultural industry, particularly where the industry is working on managing and monitoring the ‘farm to fork’ concept and every part of the supply chain.  By monitoring the supply chain, every stakeholder from the farmer, the distributors and the customers will know more about the food, where it has come from and how it was treated. The potential to then implement more technology via ‘smart farms’ becomes an even greater opportunity.

The potential to impact healthcare is perhaps one of the most significant, from patient information data which can be shared among medical practitioners, government agencies (Medicare) and then health funds.  Billing management has often been an issue in the industry and blockchain technology can simplify and improve that with the management of the ledger.  The ledger can move data, billing and payment information among the ledger within seconds as the transactions are updated.

The application of Blockchain is going to be around for a while, and analysts are predicting that this is only the start of how much it is going to disrupt many industries.