By Sandra Quinn
One of the main words bandied about when it comes to the innovation that is the blockchain, is ‘security’.
Even the smallest bit of research into the vast world which the blockchain encompasses, will tell you that the blockchain is a ledger of truth – an open and distributed ledger, recording transactions, which cannot be tampered with.
Bringing this into the realm of cybersecurity, this means that blockchain technology can be used to protect people’s personal data from being tampered with or manipulated.
As was clear with the introduction of the new GDPR rules in May, data is becoming more and more important, both to people’s personal lives and in the business world. A number of high profile cases across the world also made people realise the true value of their personal details and how they should be protecting them.
People are not happy with the realisation that because they entered a competition to win a hamper ten years ago that the company running the competition still has their name, postal address, email address and possibly social media account details on file. What is even more worrying is if this company is hacked or if they sold the details onto a third party. Those details were given away for free on a whim to win a small competition and could now be used against them in a very real and terrifying case of identity fraud or theft.
Despite many advances in the world of computing and hacking, one of the most present and real threats to the world of cybersecurity is that data will be stolen or compromised and customers want a solid guarantee that that will not happen.
The Acronis Foundation is currently using blockchain technology to enhance their cybersecurity.
The data can be signed with a digital signature, called a hash, and every transaction on the blockchain is completely transparent, so that the data stored remains authentic and true.
Because of the nature of the hash algorithm, if even a tiny aspect of the data is changed, the hash is completely different.
This could spell the future of cybersecurity in a very real and verifiable way.