10 Industries That Could Use Blockchain Technology

Another repost from my blog. Original post available at this link: http://bitcoinbuildify.com/index.php/2018/04/14/10-industries-that-could-use-block-chain-technology/

WHO NEEDS BLOCKCHAIN?
Basically any industry with a need for somehow striking a balance between access, privacy and security or some combination thereof can benefit from blockchain technology. And, in today’s online, switched on, plugged in, constantly live world the number of these industries is almost incalculable. The implications of this technology are enormous.

Blockchain essentially provides a tamper proof ledger of digital events. And, as I said in my last blog post, the potential uses of this type of technology extend way beyond cryptocurrencies. Crypto currency is, in fact, only one area where blockchain may be used. To be fair, though, cryptocurrencies are a very good example of use and I think it would be fair to say that crypto has successfully catapulted the term “blockchain” into public awareness. If it weren’t for the rise in popularity of cryptocurrencies, the notion of blockchain technology may well have remained an obscure term really only understood by software engineers and data analysts.

You could even say that the notion of cryptocurrencies are doing for blockchain technology what the notion of e-commerce has done for the internet. One good use of a new technology and it doesn’t take long for others to catch on to how the new platform could be used for other things. So, just as the internet had its humble beginnings as a “way for nerds to talk” and then went on to become one of the biggest technological revolutions well… ever, we may well see a similar rise in the use and applications of blockchain technology.

WHY IS BLOCKCHAIN SO APPLICABLE?
The early pioneers of this technology were more concerned with devising a way of protecting intellectual property in digital form than they were with creating a digital currency like Bitcoin or its many, many offshoots. That is, they were looking for a way to secure the identity, accessibility and privacy of digital text, video, music and images according to parameters established by the needs of the community handling them. They wanted to 1) create a system where the identity of digital media could be indisputably confirmed 2) without compromising that portion of their contents deemed private from the public and 3) without using a 3rd party to do it. Click here to read my previous post where this is discussed in slightly more detail.

This was formulated quite clearly in a paper entitled “How To Time-Stamp A Digital Document” which was written in 1991, some years before the rise of the internet and its becoming established as a near necessity for any kind of normal social or professional life. It was a time very different from now and the validity of these ideas simply didn’t have the audience or communal need they do now.

What I mean is, at the time this paper was written, the world of digital documents was far smaller and most of the population dealt with computers and digital technology only rarely. The ideas presented in “How To Time-Stamp A Digital Document” simply weren’t very important to many people or institutions back in 1991. Fast forward to the early 21st century and the ideas and needs proposed in this paper are more pertinent than ever.

Figures vary but it is no exaggeration to say that we are rapidly becoming a digitally oriented society. We live increasingly in a digital world. Our banking, our education, our work even our healthcare and much of our social lives are going online. Arguments for and against this aside, the statistics would argue that our time spent online and the capacity we have as “netizens” is only growing. And with it there will inevitably be new needs to be met and better, more secure and efficient ways of meeting them.

WILL BLOCKCHAIN MAKE A DIFFERENCE?
Yes. As it is now there is a tremendous but mostly unaddressed need for something like the blockchain. The reason is this: blockchain technology introduces an entirely new way of record keeping and data tracking in a way that is both public and private, accessible and secure.

And, actually, the more I personally learn about it the more I would agree that the blockchain is the next logical step in the evolution of both the internet and digital data management. This is because while the internet has proved an amazing platform for both sharing and accessing information, there is almost no unity to it. Literally anyone anywhere can say whatever they want and are free to create or destroy almost anonymously.

This creates an inevitable element of arbitrariness wherein the legitimacy and authority of something is, beyond a certain degree, somewhat difficult to maintain. The reason for this is that the internet itself, to a large degree, shares many of the same problems of digital documents. This has so far remained a rather small problem and we have been able to negate its effects with different levels of security, passwords, and vast teams of both human being and automated programs continually scanning for, detecting and usually (no where near always) dealing with them behind the scenes.

Just think of all of the stories of hacking and cyber attacks in the news. Think of what a hassle it can be to deal with online banking or sending money. And think of the enormous sums of money to keep the whole thing going under so much stress and bombardment. Aside from finance, there is also a tremendous amount of waste and expense in the form of maintaining and updating what are generally inefficient, out of date or sometimes completely obsolete systems in almost every industry across the planet. Blockchain technology, with its incredible transparency and infallible accuracy, could go a long way toward fixing this.

Keep in mind, however, that this is not to say that the systems we have in place are a failure; only that they stand to be improved upon. And isn’t improvement what technological advancement is about?

INDUSTRIES THAT COULD USE BLOCKCHAIN TECHNOLOGY

Below is a list of just a few of the industries and services that could be vastly affected, even revolutionized by blockchain technology. To be honest, the list could be much longer but I’ve tried to keep it as varied and broad as possible without writing a book about it. You will also probably notice a lot of similarity in what improvements blockchain brings to each industry and how it does it. That is, again, because we are moving increasingly into a digital world. And it is only in the world of digital media and transaction that the block chain can exist.

1. IOT NETWORK MANAGEMENT
   The Internet of Things or “IOT” is a force to be reckoned with. And one that is growing stronger everyday. It is the increasingly interconnected and artificially intelligent online nature of the appliances, devices and machines around us. Statements such as “my vacuum cleaner told my refrigerator to tell my phone to tell me to get a new filter” may not be so far fetched in the very near future. Well, at least some version of that statement will surely come about at some point.

Just as we originally designed machines to make our lives easier. We are now designing them to help each other make our lives easier. Everything from our phones to our TVs. Our cars to our stereos are becoming increasingly more customizable and “smart” in the way they respond both to each other and to the environment. While, on the one hand, this means unprecedented convenience in daily life, it also means an unprecedented risk of exposure to hackers. A hacker getting in to your TV may not be a big deal. A hacker getting into your phone or your car? Well, it goes without saying that that would be a problem

Like it or not, the current state of digital technology is a double-edged sword. There is a big gap in security that the blockchain could fill rather nicely. The way it would do this is through encryption and a pre-established, verified relationship being required for any kind of information exchange (this is a specialty of the blockchain and part of what makes it so powerful).

Common sense, to say nothing of current trends, would indicate that the IOT is only going to become a more and more present element in our lives. There is just too much benefit and incentive for it not to be. Yet, with the current state of affairs where a skilled hacker (or even an unskilled one for that matter) can penetrate into even the most secure systems in the world, we will only find ourselves increasingly more vulnerable to cyber attacks in the form of identity theft, privacy invasion or, more frighteningly, control of the major institutions currently keeping civilization somewhat civilized.

Looking at what is at risk and comparing it to what blockchain technology could do, it seems safe to say that not only is this area one in perhaps the greatest need of this technology, it will probably be one of the first to see mass adoption.

1. HEALTHCARE
   Healthcare is another area where blockchain technology could make things much simpler and more efficient; especially in the United States where, currently, no single, unified system exists. Healthcare in the US is about as cohesive nationwide as the retail industry. That is: it’s not. Prices of service and the inner workings of administration can vary enormously depending on which hospital, which GMO, which insurance company and/or which geographic area the patient resides in. This makes what is already a complex industry even more complex.

The basic idea in using blockchain technology in healthcare would be as a means of keeping patient records and employing smart contracts as a means of overseeing treatment and directing payment.

Patients would have control over their own records and who accesses them by having their own private key (just like with a Bitcoin wallet). This would do away with a large degree of the currently rampant overcharging, inefficiency, corruption and general backwardness of the current healthcare system.

The use of smart contracts would also guarantee a much higher degree of compliance, transparency and verifiability than is generally possible today. This would have unique implications for the healthcare industry where patients often literally have no idea what they’re going to get until after they’ve been charged for it.

There is also talk of using blockchain technology in the healthcare industry in a new approach termed “value based healthcare” where patients would pay for the results of treatment instead of service rendered. A subtle difference but one that would, again, introduce a much higher level of compliance and quality to the industry.

1. RETAIL LOYALTY POINTS
   Retail loyalty point programs could also stand to be improved upon with Blockchain technology.. As it is now, a lot of these types of programs rely on stamps, cards and coupons. They are kind of old-fashioned in this regard and it can often be more trouble than it’s worth (or at least seem that way) for customers to be bothered with simply hanging on to all that stuff. Add to that a high risk of fraud and the situation begs for blockchain technology to come to the rescue.

One way this could be done is for a retail chain to create it’s own cryptocurrency redeemable in the same way that coupons and loyalty cards are for discounts, prizes and special offers. With a blockchain to support the retail chain’s custom cryptocurrency, it would be a breeze for both the company and the customers to stay on top of the status of their earnings and eligibility for rewards.

It could all be done online, too. This would mean far less paper work and a way easier time for everyone involved. No more wallets full of coupons and stamp cards. No more trying to sort through it all in line at the store. It would probably also mean a higher rate of return customers, too.

If you’re curious about companies already exploring and offering these kinds of services, we’d recommend BitQyck and NUI Social. They’re both doing amazing work in the area of fusing cryptocurrency/blockchain technology with the retail industry.

1. SUPPLY CHAIN MANAGEMENT
   The general term “supply chain” refers to the huge endeavor of gathering the natural resources used to make products, combining and assembling them into useable products and delivering them to the retailer. It is an absolutely massive part of the activity of humanity. So massive in fact that almost no jobs or industries fall outside of it.To a very real degree, we are all somehow connected to and dependent on the global supply chain for everything from the food we eat to the clothes we wear. From cars we drive to our smartphones. Without the global supply chain, it would be a very, very different world.

The supply chain starts with such industries as logging, mining, fishing and farming and extends all the way down to retail while including all of the logistics and seprate operations in between. It is estimated that somewhere between 75~85% of all industry on the planet is a direct part of the global supply chain.

However, even now in the 21st century with all of our computers and ultra efficient tracking technology there are still a lot of inefficiencies plaguing the supply chain particularly in the food and energy sectors. There is also what seems like an endless paper trail. Surprising as it may seem a large amount of shipping and transfer still requires old-fashioned paper documents. Tracking numbers and e-commerce aside, the supply chain is a beauracrat’s worst nightmare.

Blockchain technology, with its nearly perfect record keeping capacity and ultra-accessibility, could not only help do away with this massive paper trail and the many headaches associated with it. It could also highlight inefficiencies to a degree that would make the glaringly obvious and impossible to ignore. With a system this complex and with so many separate actors, streamlining things is no small undertaking. In implementing a central blockchain platform to bring it all together, gone would be much of the red tape, bureacracy and general confusion involved in today’s juggling act of keeping the global supply chain functioning.

This could rapidly increase the speed of transaction and production as well as save enormously on costs. Blockchain technology would essentially bring to the global supply chain a cohesive and trackable path to all transactions for products from the natural resources being taken from the earth, to manufacture to final retail sale.

1. THE ENERGY SECTOR
   There are actually quite a few similarities betweent the global supply chain and the energy sector. In fact, they are very much interconnected. So, in both areas, blockchain technology would allow an unprecedented level of access and secure verification between an almost limitless number of parties on a central grid where all transactions and contracts would be cryptographically secured.

The energy sector is another area that could benefit greatly from blockchain technology. It is big, complex, multi-faceted and involves an almost unimagineable amount of money moving around. Also with the increasing diversification between multiple sources of generation (solar, gas, wind, oil etc.) the picture is only getting more complex. There is also a significant need for a trustless system wherein customers are guaranteed the fairest and most accessible price structure. Let’s face it, energy is important. Whether to keep the lights on, wash you clothes, cook your food or to take a bath we all need it and would be in a really tough spot without it.

On top of the vast complexity of the energy grid and its potential for abuse and all kinds of corruption via price fixing and monopolies, it is also hugely wasteful. Estimates currently suggest upward of 68% of electricity generated on the grid is lost. This number is a composite of electricity both lost and waste. While not all of this may be directly fixed by blockchain technology, data concerning the specific points of loss and waste could potentially be analyzed far more efficiently with it.

1. DATA MARKETPLACE
   Accurate data about a customer means the difference between closing a sale or not. With the rise of the internet, we have seen the corresponding rise of the data marketplace. It is somewhat of a back end market in that (even though it tends to form the core of their online experience in search and what ads they see and don’t see) the public is never really involved with it in a direct way. The data marketplace is a market for data between companies and corporations looking to leverage their campaigns and target them to the perfect audience. Think Google Ads or Facebook Ads. Think any business with any data at all that could be useful to another company selling a particular product or service. There is an incomprehensible amount of data out there on us “netizens”. Everything from the movies and kinds of food we like to the places you go and who you hang out with (and their information, too) is known by a number of companies. The chances are if you do it online, somebody somewhere knows about it.

And this data can be tremendously valuable for those who need it. The trouble is though that there is just so much of it. Literally billions and billions of online transactions recorded and stored everyday. And, even if your company is leveraging their data to a remarkable degree, the likelihood is that most of the data you have is going unused. And this is because companies need to be very specific and highly targeted in what data they use to drive sales. The rest of the data is basically the haystack left over after the needle has been found.

But what if another company could establish a parameter (smart contract) for the type of data they need for their operation and was willing to pay handsomely for it? This kind of data is, afterall, not too easy to come by and can literally mean the difference between a profitable campaign and total bankruptcy. The potential for this kind of market is amazing.

What blockchain technology would do is to establish a kind of substratum through which companies could initiate, manage and close transactions involving the exchange of highly targeted and therefore highly valuable data between each other. The blockchain would serve as a kind of broker between companies in order to modulate the flow of transactions and bring in a higher level of security and a much lower need for trust to what could be a very dicey type of market.

1. ID TECHNOLOGY
   The process of being able to accurately identify people has always been somewhat tricky. Until recently, it remained exceedingly difficult to accurately keep track of who was who, where they came from and what they were about. It wasn’t until 1919 that mandatory ID cards were first introduced. The first attempt was in England at the end of WWI and they were promptly abandoned because people resented being, what was to them, branded like cattle.

Which brings us to one of the more difficult issues about identification: privacy. While having a standardized system of ID can bring massive benefits to a society, there is also a darker side. In making identification of a person easier, you also make access to and control of the person easier. This has been shown whenever a population has been marginalized. You see identification, past a certain degree, can facilitate discrimination. The Nazis had their lists. So did the Union Breakers, So do the police and so does just about every industry involved with large numbers of human beings. In “plugging into the system” we also sacrifice a certain degree of independence and privacy. Most of us are blissfully unaware of this. But the fragility of the situation tends to become rather obvious if we suddenly find ourselves the helpless victim of fraud, hacking, state violence or some other form of attack made possible simply because someone had access to information concerning our identity.

In introducing the world of digital media to the equation, the problem has only grown by introducing a previously almost non-existent phenomenon known as identity theft. For those in the past to whom the thought of carrying an identity card or “papers”, as we so often see in films, was considered invasive they simply could not possibly imagine how much control someone can have over us in a completely digitalized world.

The differences between a digital and analog (paper and pen) system are night and day. And for every increase in the degree of efficiency and access there is, at the current time, an increase in the degree of vulnerability. So, the notion of a decentralized ID system using blockchain technology is quite an appealing one, no? The essential premise is that each person with an ID on the blockchain would carry a private key and the ability to control who sees their information and how much of it they can see.

There could also be certain parameters (smart contracts) employed in certain situations such as job interviews, background checks, airport security checks, doctors visits and so on in order to automatically censor the interaction of a 3rd party with one’s personal information to the degree required and no further.

1. COPYRIGHT AND ROYALTY TRANSPARENCY
   This industry is probably closest to what the original creators of the blockchain had in mind when they started devising a way to build it: how to protect the identity and integrity of digital documents. Click here to read all about it.

In the world of copyright and royalties, a lot depends on the fine print in the contract and how well a third party lives up to their word in following it. Needless to say, the rate of honesty in this industry is somewhat less than 100%.

There is no shortage of artists, writers, inventors and others being shorted out of their share or out-right defrauded in the news and history alike. The trouble is not simply dishonesty in the industry but also the fact that it can be rather difficult to accurately track such a vast amount of data and make sure the original creator of the work is getting their fair share every time.

Blockchain technology, being a decentralized ledger extaordinaire. would make just such a thing very easy. Anyone with rights to a work registered on the blockchain (and it could be any type of digital document whatsoever at all) would be able to maintain exclusive control over them. They would also be able to track royalty payments in real time.

1. EDUCATION
   This is an industry where the use of blockchain technology may not be immediately obvious. Don’t schools keep good enough records themselves? Well, in today’s world where the lines of what constitutes one’s education are becoming increasingly blurred blockchain could serve as a register for one’s real education. That is, not simply the school’s you’ve been to and the marks you received but such things as on the job training, on and offline courses you’ve taken, skill learned, work experience and general patterns and trends in your learning efforts that no single report card or letter of recommendation could ever match.

I think most of us can agree that the days of “college degree equals a great career” are long gone. There are many reasons for this but they all tend to boil down to this: the correlation between going to school and being a functional, creative, contributive and vital member of a company or startup is a rather weak one.

Employers and potential team members care more about what you can actually do more so than where you sat in a classroom. Education, in terms of the absorption and impartation of functional real world skills is increasingly happening on the go, in the real world even “in the wild” so to speak.

If you had a million dollars to start a company but needed a team to get it going, where would you go? Would you start calling and emailing the biggest universities to see who their brightest students were or would you start looking in the real world for people who actually have experience in doing what you want to do?

Of course there is some crossover here but it stands to reason that one’s formal education is not necessarily an accurate gauge of their actual skill. The opposite is also true in the sense that there are individuals out there with phenomenal skill sets and accomplishments and no real “education” to show for it.

So, essentially, a blockchain registry for one’s educational profile would provide a better, more focused and more accurate picture of who an individual actually is in terms of functionality and experience. Interesting stuff, no?

1. REAL ESTATE
   The real estate industry is often fraught with risk, exorbitant fees. and outright fraud; especially in the rental industry. On top of this, it is also just a hassle in general for the end-users i. e. those buying, renting or selling. In the middle, there is a vast networked world of specialized knowledge, legal shenanigans and the potential for all kinds of trouble. It is really not so different from finance in general in that the reliance on 3rd parties and the potential for tomfoolery is almost unimagineable. Selling or buying a house or even just renting an apartment can often be an enormously complex undertaking.

So, it is not surprising that there are projects and startups already underway in the cryptocurrency/blockchain world seeking to bring a better option to the millions of people served by the real estate industry.

What blockchain would effectively do in real estate is to employ smart contracts in place of the more traditional 3rd party brokerage system. It is the same principle as used in the majority of industries mentioned above. In real estate however, it would mark an unprecedented change in the nature of the industry and make things exponentially simpler. Person A could literally sell a house or rent an apartment to person B with about the same effort it would take to write an email. There would also be an extremely high barrier against fraud for both end users and any and all transactions would be registered permanently on the blockchain. Confusion, abuse, fraud, fee-taking and general usery would be reduced overnight. Kind of fun to think about really.

FINAL THOUGHTS
So, there we have it. 10 industries that could be rocked and revolutionized by the implementation of blockchain technology. While there is great promise in this kind of tech, there is also quite a bit of uncertainty toward it and even, among some, outright resistance.

This has generally been the case for the majority of new technologies before and leading up to their emergence as a life changing element among those who use it. It is rare for any new innovation to immediately be recognized for what it really is. Everything from personal computers, to umbrellas, airplanes, vaccines and taxis and even the lightbulb were ridiculed at first but look what they’ve brought us today. It would be an extremely inconvenient world without these things, to say the least.

With blockchain technology it’s probably true that it’s implementation won’t bring very much of a noticeable effect to the average person. It certainly won’t be as dramatic as something like airplanes or even the smartphone. It will likely hum quietly in the background of our daily lives; just like the vast amount of information beaming through the atmosphere via wireless networks and cloud computing.

As invisible and uneventful as the rise of blockchain tech may be, its effects in terms of how much secuirty and transparency it will bring to the world and the trouble and money it will save in the end will be amazing.

PREVIEW
In my next post, I’ll be talking about the notion of disruption of the current status quo and how this will, in the long run, probably be a good thing.

Google recommends submitting a link to the original work at the bottom of the piece. So, here it is:
http://bitcoinbuildify.com/index.php/2018/04/14/10-industries-that-could-use-block-chain-technology/