How to put the bad guys out of business with blockchain

(financialpost.com) - You’d be forgiven if, when you hear the term “blockchain,” you immediately think of Bitcoin. Cryptocurrencies are taking the markets by storm, masking other use cases for the technology. Don’t be fooled, though – Bitcoin and its ilk are just one small example of the ways hyperledgers can be used. Blockchain will generate more than US$176 billion in business value worldwide by 2025, according to analysts Gartner, and exceed US$3.1 trillion by 2030. Startup Everledger, for example, is using blockchain to track the provenance of diamonds. Why? In 2000, the United Nations adopted a diamond certification program known as the Kimberley Process, the goal of which was to keep blood diamonds – those mined in war zones and used to finance conflict – off the world market by certifying and tracking the provenance of every gem. But that tracking has been on paper, subject to fraud and alteration. Everledger records 40 points of metadata for each gem to create a unique digital thumbprint, and stores it in the IBM blockchain high security network service, which is by definition readable by many, but unchangeable. As the diamond changes hands, details are appended to the chain, rather like the chain-of-custody protocol used in law enforcement for evidence in court cases – you know where it’s been, who’s touched it and where it is at all times. You know its provenance.