Agencies, companies, and departments are becoming increasingly excited about blockchain, part of the underlying technology infrastructure of Bitcoin. But Bitcoin is merely a scratch at the surface of the innovative capabilities enabled by blockchain, as it has many uses and applications across multiple sectors of the economy.
Blockchain and its related technology components allows Bitcoin to operate in a secure and safe fashion, but the same technologies can also be used in solutions outside of the cryptocurrency space. Any application that requires the secure, distributed, and auditable transfer of digital or physical assets can potentially be a fit.
These applications can include:
- Improving data management, sharing and analysis across government agencies
- Gaining the ability to manage data and/or analytic transactions involving users and devices for the internet-of-things applications (IoT)
- Improving information sharing and analysis between state, local, and federal law enforcement; and third party information sharing architectures involvement
- Enhancing security and public traveling experiences by reducing redundant checks
- Sharing of emergency responder credentials across federal, state, local, tribal and international borders by authoritative parties with no single point of failure
- Creating records and audit logs of data that cannot be manipulated and can be publicly verified without revealing personally identifiable information
- Reducing fraud in the transfer of goods across international boundaries that touch multiple entities who do not trust each other