While everyone is focused and distracted about the monetary aspects of blockchain in the form of Cryptocurrencies (HODL’ers,, you know who you are). Primarily in my opinion this is because people were born into a system where the focus or attention of money or currency is seen as the value its self.
And so keep looking at and intensively paying very close attention to the dollar value of what a crypto currency is. This is understandable and is necessary to go through the process of getting past the belief that currency is the value.
As I have been saying the cryptocurrencies are not the real drivers for the adoption of blockchain. Its all in the non-securities that are the driver. The cryptos are getting peoples attention and getting people involved. Which is fantastic and much needed right now. It’s the same thing as the beginning of the Dot Com era, when all sorts of Corporations were vesting tons of money in the most ridiculous web presence. Most of which went nowhere, but the long term investment paid off.
This article came up and is a perfect example of one version of a non-security, and it shows up in two ways.
https://cointelegraph.com/news/cisco-developing-confidential-communications-via-blockchain-in-patent-filing
Cisco has been busy filing patents for block chain, and I am giving two examples. Remember the only thing the blockchain does in this case is take care of the validation and verification to open the space, so you and another person know without question, who you are connecting with. Without the need for a 3rd party to create the trust relationship. The same is the case for nodes and devices.
If your not aware, Cisco makes networking and communication equipment. Also they are a big part of setting standards for computer networking. If there is a company out there that can develop this kind of tech on a global layer,, Cisco is certainly one of them. Any of the communication you do over the internet, phones, ect. With anyone else, no matter where they are in the world, is going through several Cisco devices.
The first patent is on the networking layer of things. Its titled: “BLOCK CHAIN BASED IoT DEVICE IDENTITY VERIFICATION AND ANOMALY DETECTION”. The patent application was approved on 10-19-2017, a link to the patent is below. It basically has to do with how devices and nodes talk with one another in a networking environment utilizing blockchain. First a device is your phone or computer you are reading this article on. A node is either a piece of networking equipment (switches, routers, any type of networked sensor in a factory, ect..) What this patent is about is how blockchain can be utilized so that every device or node knows every other device or node without question. Doesn’t matter if it is a company’s domain, an ISP providing internet service to a customer, phone talking with someone, or over the internet. It also outlines what’s called Anomaly Detection.
At this time all devices that are part of a network know each other through certificates. Which are generally provided by a 3rd party source that creates the trust for one device to know another by way of both devices checking out each other against a certificate. It works, but it is a massive headache to manage and a hell of a lot of network admins and systems admins would love to get rid of anything to do with certificates. Just the idea of getting rid of the necessity of certificates is a serious game changer.
All this level of blockchain is doing is opening up the space for two or more devices and/or nodes to talk with one another and encrypt that fact. There are a whole lot more things going on between devices and nodes, but this is huge in and of its self.
This is a link to the described patent:
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20170302663A1/en
The second patent was described in the article above. And officially named: “Group membership block chain”. This is basically using Blockchain tech with something like group chats. The patent also outlines about the Cisco Blockchain tech to create an encrypted communication in things like Messaging, video conferencing, phone communication, you name it. And like the first patent mentioned above, each person’s connection knows who the other connections are. So no 3rd party need be involved with creating the trust relationship between any persons connection..
This is a link to the patent for the group communications Blockchain which was application was approved on 3-29-2018
https://patents.google.com/patent/US20180091489A1/en
I believe most people are becoming familiar with the term decentralized, and this patent covers that aspect. However the real catch words in this Patent is the word “Ad-Hoc”, and this is huge..!!!
“Ad-Hoc” in networking terms means that no one has to be part of a secure group or domain, to create the need to know who you are communicating with, its already built in. Like all the computers, printers, and other devices in your home network. Because all devices are virtually connected to the same space, they know who the other is. It would be like you and a bunch of people all sitting at the same table talking. You may not personally know who another person is at the table or their story, but you know someone is there.
Currently in computer networking with any large company they would create a Domain. This domain creates the security so the company knows who is logging in and accessing resources in the domain. It also has mechanisms to control rights so it can grant or deny access to resources (data, information, ect). It also has mechanisms for devices in controlling not only in who can communicate with one another but how they communicate with one another. Networks can get pretty granular in how this all takes place.
Another example, when you log in to your bank account to check on the funds and transactions. You are logging on to the banks network domain, and accessing a part of the banks network, to check out your bank account.
At the moment if someone from one domain wants to talk with someone from another domain there are all sorts of hoops that someone has to go through to open up a connection. Rights have to be granted, holes in the domains firewall or DMZ have to be opened, sometimes legal agreements have to be made, sometimes special equipment needs to be purchased and configured, the list goes on. There can be huge overhead and cost involved in creating this kind of connection, all because of the necessity to create the element of knowing who you are talking with and vicea versa.
What this kind of blockchain tech is doing is eliminating the need for most of that overhead because its built into the blockchain tech. What this implies is that something like a Domain will not be necessary to create the security of knowing who you have a connection with. It doesn’t matter if it is through a grouip or private chat session, video conference, phone conversation, ect.
Now as we have seen with Facebook,, you get on to Facebook knowing they are harvesting your data. But you are under the impression that your conversation is secure and private.. But then the reality kicked in recently that indeed they have been harvesting your data and all of a sudden everyone loses their shit…
What this kind of blockchain tech is doing is giving you control over your “Virtual You”. As much as there is an “Astral You”, there is a “Virtual You”. As the Facebook circus is finally getting across to people, this is not about privacy,, that’s been gone for a long time. Its about how others are using the data from your virtual you. Which has not been possible in the past, unless you went way off grid out in the desert, forest, or isolated island. The control of the data from your “Virtual You” will come about in how you allow others to use your data and that you have the opportunity to monetize that data.
It’s getting interesting..!! Even though I just mentioned about monetizing your data, I hope this brings to light some of the things that are happening with Blockchain that have nothing to do with money. I get the function of money,, but money is dumb. The sooner this fact is woken up to,, the better..
Thanks for reading this post and play well out there.