What lies ahead in 2018 with advances in technology
Russian investors arrive at the Crypto Funding Summit, which helps investors understand cryptocurrency, in Los Angeles, California, last month. FILE PHOTO | NMG
Many industries, enterprises facing disruption from blockchain revolution.
This year promises a lot of surprises in terms of what changes technology would bring to our day to day life.
Here is how;
The technology
There is a big evolution of creative use cases in blockchain software. The technology, which traces its roots to Bitcoin, stores data as interlinked units that are connected in such a way that modifying one block requires the user to change all the others as well.
That can make tampering virtually impossible, a feature that lends itself well not just to crypto currencies but also to financial records and other important business data.
Blockchain technology provides a tamperproof ledger that can share supply chain information between separate companies that are all connected by the supply network.
This is all made possible while also providing an auditable history those regulators, experts and other users can trust and inspect without leaking that proprietary information.
According to Techcruch, Telegram’s is building a third Generation Blockchain to power its crypto currency. It aims to be able to “automatically split and merge to accommodate changes in load”.
This would mean new blocks are generated quickly and the absence of long queues helps keep transaction costs low, even if some of the services using the platform become massively popular.
It will also consist of “Instant Hypercube Routing” designed so the blockchain can maintain top speed even as it grows. Its proof of stake approach will reach consensus through a variant of the “Byzantine Fault Tolerant” protocol, again increasing speed and efficiency and it will also use 2-D Distributed Ledgers.
This means the platform can grow new valid blocks on top of any blocks that were proven to be incorrect to avoid any unnecessary forks. In other words, its “self-healing”.
Telegrams third generation blockchain will be based on a dynamic “proof of stake” secured by multiple parties with a high degree of fault tolerance.
Digital reinvention
The other driver of blockchain technologies is its enabling traditional companies innovate over their core business.
For instance Kodak and Encrypted messaging startup Telegram plan to launch their own blockchain platform and native cryptocurrency, powering payments on their chat app and photos.
Telegram is already the de facto communication channel for the global cryptocurrency community, making a natural home to its own coin and blockchain.
Kodak has an opportunity to reinvent itself through crowdsourcing of photos on any device and issuing a digital ID on all photos taken on its platform enabling monetisation of the photo by the original owner.
Fundraising for blockchain projects
Most blockchain technologies fundraise through public investment. This offers an opportunity for Public participation.
In theory, the idea behind the ICO does sound reasonable, but likewise it’s easy to be sceptical about companies with zero history in the technology magically waking up one morning and announcing that they’re getting into blockchain-related products.
Elections
Considering the complexities and transparencies involved in the voting process as evidenced in the past, blockchain technology offers a reprieve.
The underlying technology can be used to power a mobile election voting platform that uses smart biometric and real-time identification ID verification for security and irrefutability.
The platform can be positioned to enable people to vote in many different types of elections and voting events via a secured smartphone or tablet, while at the same time overcoming concerns around security, auditability and voter anonymity.
Real Estate
A conundrum of the real estate market is the high costs during the process of transactions. The inefficiency is not caused by the lack of opportunity to sell a commercial or residential property. The market itself is quite liquid.
The real problem is the high costs of investment during the construction process. Moreover, investors are often trapped for a long time as their commitment of investing in building an apartment block cannot be easily redeemed.
There are two main obstacles that prevent the real estate investment market to reach its full potential: long-term commitment and high barriers to enter.
Cybercriminals and rogue nations are switching out of bitcoin into other, less well-known crypto currencies as Bitcoins popularity surges.
Bitcoin, despite claims to the contrary, has never been fully anonymous.
Transactions over the bitcoin blockchain can be traced. Monero is a private, secure, untraceable, decentralised digital currency.
Which promises anonymity thus making it is a preferred medium of crypt currency for unlawful purposes. It places one at a complete control their funds, and nobody can trace your transfers unless you allow them to do so.
Connecting to public Wi-Fi networks has always come with a certain level of risk, but in a new twist, the next time you connect at your local cafe, it could be hijacked to mine for cryptocurrencies – cryptomining.
PAYE Tax Calculator
Note: The results are not exact but very close to the actual.
