CB Insights lists blockchain use cases beyond banking and payments

The buzz around blockchain technology reached new heights last year with companies across multiple sectors increasingly entering this space. With the beginning of 2016, companies and financial institutions started rigorous experimentation with this innovative technology.

In a blog post, CB Insights has put together several blockchain use cases that go beyond banking and payments. Blockchain technology is essentially a public ledger that securely and automatically verifies and records a high volume of transactions digitally. As such, the technology could transform several industries including:

Cybersecurity: The post said that with widespread adoption of the technology, the probability of hacking could go down. Blockchain reduces conventional cybersecurity risk simply by removing the need for virtually all human intermediaries.

Academic records and academia: The technology could be used to authenticate academic certificates. In this context, CB Insights said that the problem of fake academic certificates, transcripts, and diplomas could be easily tackled with blockchain technology, which also reduces time and costs involved in manual checks and paper documents.

Voting: Blockchain can serve as the medium for casting, tracking and counting votes eliminating the possibility of voter-fraud, lost records, or fowl-play. Full transparency of the blockchain-based voting system would ensure that no votes were changed or removed, and no illegitimate votes were added. 

Networking and IoT: Blockchain technology could serve as the backbone of a decentralized network of IoT devices. Without a central control system to identify one another, the devices would be able to communicate with one another autonomously to manage software updates, bugs, or energy management.

Supply chain management: The technology can substantially transform this industry as it enables more secure and transparent monitoring of transactions. With blockchain, as products change hands across a supply chain from manufacture to sale, the transactions can be documented in a permanent decentralized record — reducing time delays, added costs, and human errors.

Government and public benefits: CB Insights noted that the distribution of aid and welfare is one area where blockchain can help streamline and secure public governance. To this end, it cited the example of  GovCoin Systems Limited, a London-headquartered financial technology company, which is supporting the UK government in the distribution of benefits.

In addition, the blog post listed several other use cases including car leasing and sales, forecasting, online music, ride sharing, stock trading, real estate, insurance, healthcare, cloud storage, energy management, sports management, and gift cards and loyalty programs.