Legislators in Illinois have advanced a bill that aims to create a task force that will explore the benefits accruing from a transition to a blockchain-based system for recordkeeping and service delivery for the local governments.

House Resolution 120 passed with 98 votes last week, CoinDesk reported. It seeks to create the Illinois Legislative Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Task Force which will include representatives from the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation (IDFPR), the Cook County Recorder of Deeds and the Department of Innovation and Technology.

The inter-governmental task force will particularly focus on the opportunities and risks associated with using blockchain and distributed ledger technology (DLT), different types of blockchains and consensus algorithms, blockchain use cases currently under development and how these can be applied in Illinois, how to modify existing State laws to support digitized recordkeeping, and the State Public Key Infrastructure and digital signatures.

According to the document text, the task force will present its findings and recommendations to the General Assembly in a report by January 1, 2018.

The state of Illinois has been ramping up efforts in the blockchain and DLT space. In March 2017, the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation joined the R3 blockchain consortium, becoming the first state level regulator to join the group.

In December 2016, a consortium of Illinois state and county agencies officially launched the Illinois Blockchain Initiative to explore innovations presented by this innovative technology. The initiative kicked off a month-long virtual blockchain hackathon ‘IBI Hack’ on July 01.

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