The advantage of the cantankerous-blockchain protocol for public registries is that it tin unite any number of existing ledgers in one ecosystem and does not need to upgrade the protocols of such blockchains. In elementary terms, the protocol works as an aggregator of tokens across blockchains. The protocol conceptually comprises two major elements:

  • The format requirements for an entry past knowing the standard of a tape, the user's machine tin can automatically collect records from various ledgers in one bundle.
  • The hook, which is the algorithm that scans blocks of ledgers and extracts recognized records (when they comply with the format) in one overlaid database.

The resulting representation of the nerveless tokens is a logical superstructure across many blockchains — the public registry. Information technology is decentralized considering the same algorithms are applied to every node independently. So, a authorities bureau, for case, doesn't exclusively ain 1 public property database, simply it literally lives on every user'south machine in the cross-blockchain database.

Cross-blockchain database

As we discussed the level of the protocol in Office 2, we have a component of governance to address legal issues and enforce lawful decisions. The subsystem works as a ready of patches and filters for users' records. Fifty-fifty though formally compliant with the format, the user's record can be filtered out as the jurisdiction recognizes it illegal or void.

The public registry built on the cantankerous-blockchain protocol aligns with three fundamental principles for decentralization:

  • Technological pluralism. Blockchain should be one of the technologies, and relying on it will be as equally incorrect as using central server systems; there must be a diversity of technologies simultaneously — because contest leads to progress.
  • Technological neutrality. Having multiple effective technologies in a bundle; none of these should exist privileged.
  • Blockchain doubter. The cantankerous-blockchain protocol complements the 2 above principles to enable using credible ledgers in i bundle. Developers can create blockchain doubter applications, and their users volition be costless to choose whatever blockchain in such a bundle or transfer their assets from ledger to ledger if one does non suit their purposes.

Digital identity and electronic signatures

Information technology is articulate that governments will not allow bearding transactions with immovable backdrop while we live in a world full of terrorist threats, bug of money laundering and blockchains that tin can potentially veil such activities.

To address these, at that place must be verified digital identities, only without exposing personal data on-concatenation at the aforementioned time. And the answer to that is the combination of old and new technologies. The applied science of public key infrastructure, or PKI, has existed for decades. Countries of the European Wedlock are an example of the mass adoption of PKI through their legislative framework of eIDAS regulation. Estonia, for example, offers the Estonian eastward-Residency, which is a smart card with a private primal within the chip.

In PKI, users create an asymmetric pair of private and public keys. The individual key is used to encrypt transactions, creating a so-chosen digital signature. The public decrypts the signature and verifies the transaction if information technology is signed with the respective individual cardinal. To maintain the validity of the public key, the user will enquire a document authorisation to create a publicly available certificate where it includes the user'due south public key.

PKI is a centralized arrangement that is prone to various vulnerabilities. We cannot eliminate a trusted third party to verify our identities, simply we can accost several types of attacks on the centralized PKI infrastructure. Blockchain engineering is the perfect solution to develop a new generation of PKIs. Remember virtually public certificates as tokens. Like to creating tokens (certificates) of property, nosotros tin also create tokens to certify our identity. If you lose your private key, you lot will need to contact your certificate authority and ask to update its token of your identitiy (certificate) as invalid.

In that location is no demand to publish any personal information on-chain, instead only a cryptographic representation, which links to the personal information without exposing it.

To reduce the risks of leaks of personal data from centralized servers, we should use cocky-sovereign identities. For case, a selective disclosure protocol can be practical to shop personal data on a user's device, a smartphone, and reveal transaction details in a limited manner.

Digital identity is a separate topic that requires a lot of attention, and it was elaborated in relation to the recent Twitter hack, Europe's experience with due east-signatures and blockchain's ability to forbid data leaks.

Conclusions

Having all these technologies and concepts in mind, we encounter a larger moving picture. Apparent public blockchains provide immutable ledgers, which, opposite to traditionally state-endemic property registries, enable users to perform peer-to-peer transactions. All the same, blockchains practise not require any public agency to maintain the infrastructure, every bit public ledgers are self-governed.

Title tokens are records that represent legal rights. They are validated on-chain by those whom we trust and delegate this right. Trusted third parties are needed not only because a person cannot certify their birth and expiry, for example, to enable inheritance procedure only for whatever legal issues and law enforcement that inevitably arise. Through tertiary parties and the cross-blockchain protocol, we can create an ecosystem of blockchains where users create and certify all sorts of rights, facts and digital identities.

Trusted records in an interoperable cross-chain environment

This concept is improve than the current centralized systems, as information technology runs through the framework of smart laws and digital authorities, and they are the digital form (filters and patches) with the rooted records of addresses belonging to representatives whom people delegate the mandate of power for legal governance. Contrary to the centralized organisation, ledgers crave everything to exist recorded on-chain publicly to take effect, and they do non alter recorded transactions. So, on-chain governance is transparent and accountable.

This concept cannot be implemented overnight, but its advantage is that it can be piloted step-by-step and run parallel to the existing system of public registries. The shift will happen when the authorities that wants to benefit from innovations recognizes the right of citizens to choose between a traditional registry and a blockchain, and it is a fundamental correct for the decentralization of governance.

This is office iii of a iii-role series on the theory of title token — read role one on the blockchain manor registry here, and part two on cross-blockchain protocol and smart laws here.

The views, thoughts and opinions expressed hither are the writer's solitary and do non necessarily reflect or represent the views and opinions of Cointelegraph.

Oleksii Konashevych is the author of the Cross-Blockchain Protocol for Government Databases: The Technology for Public Registries and Smart Laws. Oleksii is a Ph.D. fellow in the Articulation International Doctoral Degree in Law, Scientific discipline and Technology program funded past the Eu government. Oleksii has been collaborating with the RMIT University Blockchain Innovation Hub, researching the utilise of blockchain technology for east-governance and due east-republic. He also works on the tokenization of real estate titles, digital IDs, public registries and east-voting. Oleksii co-authored a law on e-petitions in Ukraine, collaborating with the country's presidential assistants and serving as the manager of the nongovernmental eastward-Democracy Group from 2022 to 2022. In 2022, Oleksii participated in drafting a bill on Anti-Money Laundering and taxation issues for crypto avails in Ukraine.