When it comes to coupling emerging technologies, blockchain and artificial intelligence (AIs) make the proverbial “swipe-right” match made in Tinder heaven…for technologies. However, there’s more to it than just a whimsical pop-cultural reference made to dating apps. The creation of applications based on the blockchain and AI combo can accomplish several spectacular things in today’s data-centric age.

On that note, Dr Praphul Chandra joined us at Genesis DevCon to render an insightful tech talk on using blockchains and AIs to build better tech infrastructures and the opportunities and challenges involved thereof.

Before we delve into the details of the tech talk, let’s get to know our speaker.

Getting to Know Dr Praphul Chandra

Praphul Chandra — Founder & Chief Scientist, KoineArth, is a scholar with a remarkable understanding of blockchain technology, artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning. He established Koinearth — a startup working at the intersection of blockchains, machine learning and mechanism design. Prior to KoinEarth, he worked for 11 years at HP in several research roles and as the Principal Data Scientist. He has a penchant for learning and sharing his knowledge with the world which brought him to join us at Genesis DevCon.

Given that Blockchain and AIs are technologies that have the potential to streamline data management based on cognitive learning, Dr Chandra shared an elaborate account on how these two technologies can be brought together.

Understanding the Value Proposition of Blockchains and the Multi-entity Networks Within Them

We all know that blockchains are decentralised ledgers that can provide immutability, accountability, and transparency to technological infrastructures. However, to truly understand what they represent, we need to know their value proposition. Therefore, blockchains allow us to achieve the following things:

• ‎Formation of a multi-entity network, where each entity (node) maintains its own copy of the ledger
• ‎The synchronisation of the ledgers is taken care of by the underlying technology. — A synchronised multi-party network.
• ‎Creation of an auditable synchronised network — any information/transactions recorded on the network is non-repudiation and immutability, creating accountability.
• ‎The enforcement of contracts.

‎The term smart contracts is a misnomer. In terms of ML and AI, there is nothing “smart” about smart contracts. A more accurate term would be an auto-enforcing contract. Once the terms of a contract are written in a certain programming language, it is guaranteed to execute whatever is in it without the intervention of any single party. This is what a contract enforcing auditable synchronised network represents.

‎Contract enforcing ledgers can go a step ahead of this. On assuming that you have cryptocurrencies, parties can automate payments based on the completion of these terms and conditions. However, this comes with a fork in the road.

‎In unfriendly-crypto regulations, when the terms of the contract have been enforced and we can balance account payables and account receivables. In crypto-friendly regulations, you can go ahead and balance the payments within the ledger because the contract controls the currency.

Given that these are the points of value derived from blockchains, they are effectively derived by the entities in a blockchain. In a public blockchain, the entities are individual people or nodes. In a B2B permission blockchain network, the entities are enterprises, regulatory parties like governments would be entities.

However, with reference to context, can an AI agent (an AI algorithm) be an entity in a blockchain network and what does that enable? To begin to understand this, Dr Chandra clarified what AIs really are.

What is Artificial Intelligence (AI)?

No matter how straightforward it seems, AI has several interpretations. Science fiction has depicted several effigies of AIs from H.A.L 9000 in Stanley Kubrik’s 2001: A Space Odyssey to Iron Man’s Jarvis in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. All these AIs demonstrate machine intelligence resembling the natural intelligence that humans show to aid in processing real-time data to provide solutions in life-threatening circumstances.

However, in the realm of computer science, AI’s have a wider range of specificities functions. An AI perceives its environment and carries out certain functions to create a certain impact or achieve a certain outcome, mimicking certain cognitive functions based on the human mind to “learn” and “solve problems”.

Banking on these perceptions, Dr Chandra delved deeper into the subject of AIs. Broadly speaking, there are three types of AI algorithms out there:

‎Supervised learning

Dr Chandra illustrated this with an example. Imagine that there is a spread with several fruits — apples, oranges, bananas, etc. You have identified the fruits as apples, oranges, and bananas. When you teach the same to a machine — that is, if you share an image of an apple to the machine and call it an apple, the machine imbibes this data via supervised learning. Supervised learning helps a machine learn from historical (label) data to identify the said fruit in the image as an apple.

‎Unsupervised Learning Algorithms

Let’s consider Dr Chandra’s spread of fruits again — the apples, oranges, bananas. This time, however, when the machine receives images of these fruits, it is not told how to identify the fruit with its corresponding name. In such a case, the machine will relate the image of the fruit to another familiar image and term it as the same.

Reinforcement Learning Algorithms

In this case, when you give the machine a bunch of images of these fruits, the machine doesn’t know what they are or how to identify them, except it derives value from them. For example, from the image of one of the fruits, the machine would identify that (for example) this fruit is good for consumption. It works on a value-action paradigm.

AIs as Oracles for Smart Contracts

A smart contract is fundamentally a piece of code which automates the payment between multiple entities as per the terms programmed in it. If you have given the authority of transferring payments to a piece of code between different entities, that piece of code holds a vital responsibility of distinguishing the amount of money that needs to be transferred in a certain circumstance from one party to another. In the blockchain literature, such an entity that informs a smart contract with data from the real world, helping it make decisions on when to transfer value and when not to transfer value is called an oracle. One of the most significant value propositions of AIs is to act as oracles to smart contracts.

Let’s take a look at some real-world examples — consider an insurance policy for crops based on a smart contract. This is a contract between two parties — the one who sells the insurance and the one who buys it. The release for payment is automated within the smart contract. The conditions under which the value can be transferred needs to be determined by the smart contract.

So, how does a smart contract determine if the crops in a certain location have failed in order to release payment? In this case, a solution that can be implemented via satellite images. An AI system can act as an oracle where it supplies the smart contract with real-time images of the crops to the smart contract to make a decision.

Similarly, this application can be used across several industry verticals. In the logistics sector, a similar application involving satellite images can ensure that automated payments are released when the transporters are required to follow a certain route. With the inclusion of devices like sensors that collect. Data on temperature, climate conditions, etc., AI systems can help smart contracts determine the quality of the goods-in-transit and release payments accordingly. This will automate several areas within the logistics side of supply chains and create efficient processes.

However, AI systems enabling blockchains is one side of the coin; let’s take a look at the other.

How Blockchains can Enable AI Systems

In the figure above, the red dots represent state-of-the-art AI algorithms, and the blue dots represent biological beings. The biological beings rank higher than the AI algorithms based on social criteria, however, the AI algorithms rank high based on their computational and autonomous capabilities. This might seem like a rhetorical fact. However, there is more to it and here is what it signifies.

In reinforcement learning (RL), a machine processes data and makes conclusions based on a value-action paradigm; that is, eating an apple is good. Now, let’s consider ten individual RL algorithms that have to learn to tell us if eating an apple is good or not. In such a case, if one of the algorithms has understood that eating apples is good, and if the algorithm has the potential to propagate the same information to the other nine algorithms, then it creates something known as a social collaborative AI.

Within this problem statement, blockchains can provide AIs with the necessary deployment architecture for the real-world collaboration of AI algorithms.

Presently, companies are becoming cognisant of the value of the data they own and they secure their privacy and confidentiality accordingly. Therefore, the challenge lies in enabling AI algorithms to perform shared learning functions with private data. Blockchains can solve this by providing the infrastructure to enable individual AI algorithms to process private data in their respective networks, and in maintaining the privacy of the data, collaborate with each other.

Challenges to Adopting a Mix of Blockchain and AI

There are several discrepancies and challenges that lie in adopting and implementing AI and blockchains. It is important that we are aware of these challenges to arrive at certain desired outcomes.

Robustness of AIs

AIs need to be robust agents fitted into platforms. There are instances where the data fed into AIs can be manipulated. Given how AI agents are responsible for the transfer of value between two entities, AI agents need to be robust and the external data coming in needs to be untampered and true. Any (unethical) vested interests will influence processes that are meant to arrive at a certain outcome, making the entire ordeal counter-productive.

Accountability for Errors

Even though technology brags of reducing error rates in processes, they are not invincible. The challenge here lies in identifying accountability to the errors that AIs can commit. So, it is difficult to hold a certain party liable for the errors.

Determining Incentives

It is difficult to understand how the incentives are distributed when an AI algorithms being used as a commercial entity.

Building Trust between AIs

We have discussed how AIs can communicate with aechothelr and share a learning process. However, building trust between AI algorithms has not been determined even with the blockchain fabric.

Real-world Applications of Blockchains and AIs

There are several challenges that arise in implementing blockchain and AIs. Nonetheless, there pros outweigh the cons significantly. One of the leading areas that derives the most from the implementation of blcokcahins and AIs in the Supply chain industry.

Take a look at these data points.

Given how blockchains are built to manage and supplement multi-entity networks with efficiency, supply chains are a jig-saw fit. However, on surveying supply chains, you will see that they are vastly convoluted. Real-world supply chains operate within complex networks where information is distributed among different entities. Additionally, supply chains are dynamic with several agents working within it, and there are several decision-makers within the network and within companies that provide these services.

The need for the distribution of information in supply chains between its various parties is vital to its success. To understand this, Dr Chandra broke down supply chains into three fundamental flows:

• ‎flows of goods and services
• ‎flow of information
• ‎flow of money

These flows operate intricately in very complex structures and this is where blockchains bring in value. If information is not shared efficiently within these structures, the implications can result in out-of-stock situations to over-stocked situations. To put this into perspective, these situations cost an estimated $1.1 trillion in loss across the world.

This poses a challenge; the fundamental problem is that we’re in a dynamic situation with dynamic optimisation based on local decisions. There are several entities trying to solve the same problems without the presence of a connected, communication network where information is shared.

How marketsN is addressing this challenge

Dr Chandra went on to share marketsN — a solution that he worked on that addresses this issue. It is a product that was built for enterprise-level supply chains. It executes three important things:

• The blockchain layer enables information sharing
• Smart Contracts align incentives of multiple entities
• ‎Org-level marketbots™ collaborate for multi-agent learning — an AI agent that acts on behalf of the organisation that deploys the marketbot™.

As we already know AIs in blockchains becomes oracles for smart contracts and blockchains can enable AIs with collaborative capabilities. A marketbot™ for a particular organisation will recommend certain actions and ascertains the value derived from those actions. However, to bring the AI agents to collaborate, Dr Chandra posits that the multi-agent reinforcement learning (MARL) algorithm can provide a solution to this issue. He found that, in such a case, the following challenges arise:

• ‎Is each one of these market bots going to optimise each organisation independently?
• Can they collaborate with each other to work more efficiently?
• ‎Do they share state information with each other?
• ‎Are actions co-ordinated between these entities?
• ‎Are their rewards aligned?

Currently, marketsN is still in the process of developing this MARL solution. However, they have used blockchain and AIs to support business network creation with permissioned blockchains and enable the transparent sharing of information. marketsN has also pre-built smart contracts work within existing ERPs and they are aligned with incentives to optimise supply chains.

Stay tuned to learn more about more tech talks from Genesis DevCon.

On Understanding Mutually Beneficial Collaborations between Blockchains and AIs with Dr Praphul… was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

The creation of legal frameworks for emerging technologies is not an easy feat. It involves several layers of comprehensive study, socio-political inquiry, inter organisational collaborations and more to come up with ideal frameworks to add to the law. In the case of blockchain technology, the Government of India is surveying the subject albeit slowly, to ensure that the implementation of blockchain technology is regulated, safeguarding all its stakeholders and ensuring fair play in the market.

On that note, Dr Pavan Duggal virtually joined us at Genesis DevCon for a spirited conversation about the legality of blockchains in India. Before we begin with Dr Duggal’s account of blockchain legality, let’s get to know him a little.

Getting to know Dr Pavan Duggal

Dr Pavan Duggal — Cyber Law Advocate, Supreme Court of India, is a pioneering thought leader in the Cyberlaw space. He has earned an international reputation as an expert and authority on Cyber Law, Cyber Security Law, and E-commerce law. He is the Founder & Chairman of the International Commission on Cyber Security Law. World Domain Day also recognises Dr Pavan as one of the Top 10 CyberLawyers around the world.

With his expertise, he has profoundly provided context to legality for blockchain technology in India. Let’s take a look at what he shared with us.

Blockchains and the Indian Government

For stakeholders of blockchain in India, these are confusing times. There are conflicting signals with respect to the rules and regulations governing emerging technologies like blockchain given that there is a serious lack of substantial clarity.

In India, after the demonetisation of banknotes in 2016, there were several people who ended up investing in Bitcoin as it solved the problem of having unaccounted money. ‎Subsequently, in the budget of 2018, Arun Jaitley — the then Finance Minister, in his speech on the budget stated that Bitcoin will not be a legal tender. However, the Government announced that blockchain technology — the technology that powers cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin — will receive a special spotlight as an emerging technology.

On that note, the government has shown great interest in adopting blockchain technology into its technological infrastructures. For example, ‎the Government of Andhra Pradesh was working on transmigrating its land records on to a blockchain to make sure that the data is digitised, publicly accessible, and most of all — immutable. This is one of the many examples of initiatives by the Government involving electronic governance focusing on blockchain.

Deriving from Existing Laws to Regulate the Blockchain Landscape in India

Presently, there is no dedicated law on blockchains by the parliament of India. Given the lack of a specific law, we will have to look at other laws pertaining to blockchain technology and its applications to understand the legal implications.

The Information Technology Act, 2000, passed almost 20 years from now, and before blockchain came into the picture, is one that we can consider as directly applicable to blockchains. This is plainly because blockchains deal with data and information in the electronic/digital format that is resident on computer resources and communication devices. In certain cases, this information can be accessed by members of the public as well.

To add to that, blockchain technology adheres to a paradigm where there is the use of computer systems, networks, resources, communication devices with the availability of data in the electronic form. With respect to this feature, blockchain is legal by virtue of Section 4 for the Information Technology Act, 2000.

With that said, if there are any legal disputes upon blockchain, we can rely on the provisions of blockchain as an emerging technology. However, specific nuances pertaining to blockchains are not covered. In the realm of automated smart contracts, the legality of blockchain doesn’t provide a clear stance. We cannot say if it is legal in India or not.

The Indian Contract Act, 1872 — a legislation that is over 150 years old, has given legality to contracts that pertain to electronic offer, normal offer, normal acceptance, leading into a valid binding electronic contract, including a normal contract. The IT Act granted legality to the electronic component of the contracts. However the question still remains, electronic contracts are managed under the ambit of the IT Act, but what are the legalities with respect to smart contracts? Well, this is a grey area. In India, it will be very difficult for the proponent of a smart contract to argue that the contract is legal.

However, India can illustrate some clarity in this “grey area” by deriving contexts from existing legal frameworks in other countries. In countries like Switzerland, Malta, Estonia, and some states in the USA, there are legal frameworks for blockchains as well as smart contracts.

With that said, there is one important factor that will need to be addressed while formulating laws with respect to smart contracts. Legal contracts are created between two parties based on free will. From a legal standpoint (possibly, during disputes), it would be difficult to prove this point, and existing legal frameworks do not have provisions to counter this complication.

So, Where Do We Go from Here?

As a nation, we have a long way to go in creating legal frameworks. Blockchain has lesser media coverage and is slowly becoming a part of the mainstream digital ecosystem as a meme (Context: not your average Internet meme, but as a cultural phenomena in which everybody is reporting the trending bit of news in tech). India should come up with specific clarity, not just to clarify that blockchain is a legal technology, but it also needs to come up with legal frameworks for smart contracts.

This would begin with making provisions under the IT Act 2000. According to Section 81 of the IT Act, the provisions of the IT Act will override any conflicting provisions in other Acts. With this in mind, lawmakers can create provisions for smart contracts that will be independent of the Indian Contracts Act, 1872.

Laws for Securing Blockchain Activities from Illegal/Malicious Use

In a recent conference on cyber law, cyber crime and, cyber security, held in New Delhi, India, — the legality of blockchains and the distinctive legal challenges were discussed. One of the prominent points that came up was with respect to securing the use of blockchains to ensure that it is not used for malicious purposes.

Blockchains stand for transparency and accountability, and because of this people believe that blockchains are sacrosanct and 100 percent secure. However, blockchain is used for some cyber crime activity as well. Just because information is available in the public domain, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it will deter all stakeholders from refraining from illegal activities. Therefore, the potentiality of blockchain usage for cyber crime and cyber security breaches cannot be ruled out. However, traceability in blockchains can help resolve this problem.

On creating provisions in the IT Act 2000 for blockchain technology, the perks of the framework will also impact legalities for other emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT).

The Bitcoin Problem from a Legal Perspective

Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies have had rough weather in India. From a legal perspective, it seems as though Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies were asking for trouble. The volatility of prices and the speculativeness of crypto assets clearly paints a picture that these assets are going to be hard to deal with.

This aspect of cryptocurrencies has left several countries at an unease. Some countries feel that Bitcoin could be prejudicially impacting security, sovereignty, and integrity of their states.

Bitcoin also comes with a dark past if you remember Silk Road and its atrocities. Since Bitcoin was used as the de facto electronic currency of the dark-net, several countries fear for the security of their citizens and how this could impact their nation’s cyber sovereignty. This is mainly why Bitcoin is illegal in some countries.

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) mandated banks to not offer banking services to any stakeholder using Bitcoin or other forms of cryptocurrency. This effectively strangulated the Bitcoin and crypto economy in India. Several Indians invested in Bitcoin, and in the time of demonetisation, holding Bitcoin was an effective means of dealing with unaccounted wealth. However, with the government coming down strongly on cryptocurrencies, India saw a transmigration of Bitcoin investors moving out of India, towards friendlier jurisdiction like Singapore, Malta, or Switzerland. At this point, what remains a loss to the Indian economy is a gain to other countries with better legal frameworks for Bitcoin and other cryptos.

Learning from the Past and Moving Towards Regulation

As a revolutionary technology that can impact several industry verticals, blockchain is here to stay. However, it is hard to substantially state the longevity of cryptocurrencies given their volatility and so on. This has left India lagging behind in the adoption race. But India can move progressively in this space if it looks towards other countries and how they are creating legal frameworks to regulate these emerging spaces.

The island country of Malta created regulatory frameworks for distributed ledger technologies (DLTs), initial coin offerings (ICOs), and cryptocurrencies. They came up with a distinctive approach of coming up with a delegated regulatory authority to oversee the further growth and enablement of blockchain. However, Malta is one of the few; in addition, we have Japan, Switzerland, Dubai, and several more. So, clearly, blockchains as tech, are having various new legal approaches that countries are adopting in the context of the same.

India cannot merely copy-paste these regulations, but it would need to customise or “Indian-ise” these legal frameworks. The Indian Government doesn’t see the creation of legal frameworks for emerging technologies like blockchain as an urgent priority. This is because we don’t have the right exposure to these technologies or the expertise they need to go forward

Blockchain can change the face of electronic governance across the world. To enable this technology, Governments need to take this more seriously and create regulations, and the effective collaboration of lawmakers and thought leaders in this space.

A Note to All Blockchain Entrepreneurs and Enthusiasts

It is commendable that India is seeing a growth in entrepreneurial activities in the blockchain landscape. To these people, Dr Duggal has the following pointers:

• Given the legal situation, you can rely on the rules, regulations, and provisions that broadly lie in the ambit of the IT Act.
• To those providing services, you have become an intermediary under Section 2 (1) (w), IT Act, 2000.

• ‎You will be subject to certain compliances with the statutory provisions of the law.
• Complying with the law will also provide you with statutory exemptions and immunity from liability.
• ‎Make sure that you have strong legal documentation.

Look out for more from Genesis DevCon!‎

The Importance of Creating Legal Frameworks for Blockchain by Dr Pavan Duggal, Advocate (SC-India)… was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

It was the year 1994 when a reputed cryptographer and legal scholar — Nick Szabo, introduced smart contracts to the world that revolutionised the concept of self-executable contracts without the need for a third party.

Given the significance of smart contracts in the decentralised technology realm, Dr Satya Peri joined us at Genesis DevCon to present a research paper on efficient smart contract designs for blockchains. Before we dive into Dr Peri’s tech talk, let’s get to know him.

Getting to know Dr Satya Peri

Sathya Peri — Associate Professor, IIT-Hyderabad Tech Talk — Distributed Computing Satya Peri is a skilled educator working at IIT-Hyderabad with a knowledge that runs deep in aspects of computer science such as Parallel computing, distributed systems, algorithm analysis, and networking algorithms. Before IIT-Hyderabad, he worked as a professor in IIT-Patna, and as a Postdoc Researcher at Memorial University and INRIA, Rennes, France. In addition to this, he has a Master’s Degree and a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Texas.

At Genesis DevCon, he shared a research paper, co-authored by Parwat Singh Anjana, Sweta Kumari, Sachin Rathor, and Archit Somani, on efficient designs for smart contracts. This paper was presented at a doctoral symposium — International Conference on Distributed Computing and Networking (ICDCN 2019), and was awarded the Best Poster Award.

Now that we know the speaker, let’s take a closer look at his tech talk on Smart contracts and blockchains.

What are smart contracts?

We’re all familiar with how blockchain technology has the power to create immutability and transparency in addition to being a decentralised ledger. One of the biggest takeaways of blockchain tech is how it combines these features to create efficient, trustless environments. On that note, it removes the need for any middle-men or third party service providers to facilitate a certain process (example: payments) via a peer-to-peer network.

A smart contract is computer code that runs on a blockchain that is basically a digital, decentralised, self-executing contracts. It is executed between two or more parties in blockchain with a pre-defined, imperative set of rules that are unanimously agreed upon. On meeting the requirements, the smart contract is executed to produce a certain outcome.

Watch the entire Tech Talk of Dr Peri walking us through the creation of smart contracts that can be concurrently executed.

The problem statement: Serial execution of transactions in blockchains causes poor throughput

Presently, we live in times where hardware devices (example: phones, laptops, tablets, etc.) run on multi-core processors. Within the realm of blockchains, serial execution of the transactions by the miners and validators fail to utilise all these cores to their full potential and as a result, have poor throughput.

To put it simply, in the blockchain environment, we have block producers and the block validators who use pieces of code to carry forward the functionalities of the blockchain. This code is running on multiple contexts in all the nodes, and we have processors placed in the systems of each of these nodes. Within this process, when one transaction is taking place between two nodes — A and B, another transaction between C and D doesn’t take place simultaneously.

Owing to this serial execution of transactions, Dr Peri’s paper explained that the

sequential/serial execution of transactions and smart contracts delays the potential of the blockchain to work more efficiently. Therefore, he posits that the concurrent or simultaneous execution of smart contracts in a blockchain with each core in the processor facilitating a certain transaction in blockchain to take place in parallel. This will potentially resolve this setback and increase the throughput. Nevertheless, there are some challenges that need to be met before we can successfully produce concurrent execution of smart contracts and transaction on the blockchain.

Challenges to concurrent execution of transactions

According to Dr Peri’s paper, these are the following challenges he faced while researching the concurrent execution of smart contracts.

• Concurrent execution of smart contracts transactions may access the conflicting shared data.
• ‎Identifying the conflicts at run-time is not straightforward.
• ‎Improper use of locks may lead to deadlock.
• ‎Discovering an equivalent serial schedule of concurrent execution of smart contract transactions is difficult.
• ‎Concurrent execution of smart contracts transactions by validator may incorrectly reject the valid block proposed by the miner.

Addressing these challenges to concurrent execution of transactions with Software Transactional Memory (STM) systems

To take on these challenges, an efficient framework to execute the smart contract transactions concurrently by miners lies in using optimistic Software Transactional Memory systems (STMs). STMs refers to a mechanism concurrency control that is analogous to database transactions for controlling access to shared memory in concurrent computing. It works as an alternative to lock-based synchronisation. In an STM, a thread completes modifications to shared memory without regard for what other threads might be doing, recording every read and write that it is performing in a log.

An STM Library exports the following methods:

• Begin
• Read
• Write
• TryCommit or TryC

There are two time-stamp protocols used to implement IITH-STM library for concurrent execution of the smart contracts:

1. Basic Time-stamp Ordering (BTO) Protocol.

In this time-stamp ordering, all transactions are issued a time-stamp based on when they are entered into the system. The protocol then manages concurrent execution determined based on the serialisation sequence, ensuring that any conflicting read and write operations are executed in the timestamp order.

2. Multi-version Time-stamp Ordering (MVTO) Protocol.

Reed’s multi-version timestamp ordering protocol solves the problem of deadlocks by ordering transactions and aborting transactions that access data out of order. It also increases the concurrency in the system by never making an operation block (though it does abort transactions.) MVTO maintains multiple versions corresponding to each shared data-objects and it reduces the number of aborts and improves the throughput.

All of the data is further captured in a block graph by the miner as dependencies on the smart contract transactions. The block graph is then used by validator to execute concurrent smart contract transactions. Moreover, two transactions which do not have a path should be able to

execute concurrently. Roughly put, the block graph will have the following properties:

• Acyclic
• Constructed by a miner concurrently.
• Topological sort of the graph should be equivalent to the miner execution.

A concurrent miner proposes a block which consists of a set of transactions, the block graph, hash of the previous block, and final state of each shared data-objects. Following this, the validators re-execute the same smart contract transactions concurrently with the help of the block graph given by miner which captures the conflicting relations among the transactions to verify final state.

If the validation is successful, then the proposed block appended into the blockchain and miner gets an incentive. In case it is unsuccessful, the proposed block is discarded. Overall, the BTO and MVTO miner performs 3.6x and 3.7x speedups over serial miner respectively; the BTO and MVTO validator outperforms with an average 40.8x and 47.1x than the serial validator respectively.

Smart contracts, concurrent executions, and beyond

The scope of such a use case can provide solutions for blockchain’s scalability issues and help increase the speed by enhancing the throughput of blockchains. This application can be executed across several base-chains like Ethereum, EOS. It can also help expedite the adoption of blockchain technology and can open doors to B2C businesses in the fintech and banking sector, helping them scale up.

Building Frameworks for the Concurrent Execution of Smart Contracts with Dr Satya Peri —… was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

In theory, blockchains are built to provide enhanced security and privacy for tech infrastructures given that they can serve as immutable, transparent ledgers. However, there are chances where security in blockchain-based applications can be compromised.

At Genesis DevCon, we invited Prof. Debdeep Mukhopadhyay from IIT-Kharagpur to join us for a tech talk on the opportunities and challenges in adopting hardware security for blockchains.

About the Speaker

Dr Debdeep Mukhopadhyay is a Professor at the Secured Embedded Architecture Laboratory (SEAL) in IIT — Kharagpur. He has published many papers in the cryptography domain and has conducted primary research into Computer Architecture and Fault Tolerance.

With his expertise in the field of cryptography and computer science, he conducted an engaging tech talk at Genesis DevCon. Here is a glimpse of all the topics that were covered.

Five salient points from Dr Mukhopadyay’s tech talk

Security issues in blockchain

Security in Blockchain is an aspect that is still evolving. It differs for private and public blockchains. However, on surveying the subject, security is defined by four important aspects:

• Limiting access to information through confidentiality.
• Assurance that the information is trustworthy & accurate with Integrity.
• Guaranteeing the reliable access to information with the availability of data.
• Ensuring data and user privacy.

Based on this, security issues can be addressed by using suitable crypto-primitives. In computer science, cryptographic primitives are well-established, low-level cryptographic algorithms that are used to build cryptographic protocols for computer security systems. These routines include but are not limited to, one-way hash functions and encryption functions.

A Blockchain-based IC Supply Chain Protection Scheme

In an IC Supply Chain, there are several points of time where there’s a need for transparency and traceability. From the point of time where the intellectual property (IP), the tools, standard cells, and models are procured, to the point where the ICs are deployed and monitored, blockchain has the potential to provide end-to-end tracking solutions to secure the concerned networks.

This can be achieved in the IC Supply Chain problem with a decentralized permissioned platform accessible by the supply chain ecosystem. Blockchain can be used for a global tamper-proof system for digitizing IC trade flow and tracking end-end shipments.

However, it is restricted to only digital transactions: blockchains in its original form falls short of providing authenticity of physical devices.

Authentication using Physically Unclonable Functions

A Physically Unclonable Function (PUF) is derived from a physical object that provides a physically-defined “digital fingerprint” output based on given input and set conditions. This digital fingerprint will serve as a unique identifier, most often for a semiconductor device such as a microprocessor. PUFs are usually implemented in integrated circuits and are typically used in applications with high-security requirements, more specifically cryptography.

On applying blockchains and PUFs to an IC supply chain, a verifier key is stored in a tamper-proof memory based off of a Security Credential Generator. This can ensure the beginning of securing the supply chain network in an end-to-end manner.

Here are the challenges that are being aided with respect to creation PUFs:

• Model-building and side-channel resistant reliable PUF designs
• Fault Tolerance of PUFs
• Test Strategies for PUFs: metrics for assessing architectures of PUFs

Securing Blockchain Keys from Side-Channel Analysis

Blockchain keys are used for several vital cryptographic operations.

They are used for signature generations and are branded as the root of trust of the authenticity of blockchains. In many applications, the keys are stored and processed through hardware. However, they need to be secured against side-chain analysis.

In side-chain analysis or side chain attacks, an attacker may use information leaked from a side-channel resulting from physical implementations. This is called side-channel analysis (SCA) and it

may endanger the overall security of a system. However, blockchain keys — being one that is susceptible to side-chain attacks — need to be secured with strong cryptographic algorithms.

Blockchains and Hardware Wallets

Hardware wallets are essential for those operating within a blockchain. Given how the security of the blockchain is solely relying on the user who is responsible for keeping his funds safe, hardware wallets can ensure that private keys are secured. They need to be designed with suitable protections like cold storage, which means the keys never leave the device and are not exposed to the Internet. However, there must still be precautions taken against any side-channel attacks.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Look out for more tech talks from Genesis DevCon.

Read all about how IoT and blockchain technology can enhance hardware security in several areas.

Reviewing Hardware Security and Blockchains with Dr Debdeep Mukhopadyay — Professor, IIT-Kgp, at… was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

When blockchain made its debut with Satoshi Nakamoto’s Bitcoin, it became groundbreaking technology that revolutionised the way people could make payments and money could be transferred around the world. However, blockchain is one of the technologies that caught on to the hype and there are several other cryptography-based technologies that are just as amazing by themselves.

On that note, Genesis DevCon witness Dr Chang Ee Chien, a professor and researcher, deliver an insightful tech talk on a technology that could enhance blockchain applications — Trusted Execution Environments. Before we dive into the tech talk and what it was about, let’s learn a little more about Dr Chang.

Get to know Dr Chang Ee Chien

Dr Chang Ee-Chien is a scholar in the field of computer science. He has written and co-authored several research papers involving cryptography, cloud security, adversarial machine learning, and cybersecurity. His domain authority is tremendous and through his tech talk, you will find that his knowledge is backed with several years of research.

Presently, he is an associate professor in the Department of Computer Science, School of Computing, NUS.

Now that you have an idea about Dr Chang, let’s take a look at some important points from his tech talk.

What is a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE)?

We’re all familiar with what blockchain is. Trusted Execution Environments (TEEs) began to resurface due to recent developments in the technology and the niche sector that is privacy accommodations. It has the potential to be disruptive.

To put it in a nutshell, TEEs provide trusted execution in a privacy-preserving environment.

A Trusted Execution Environment (TEE) is a hardware-based or software-based execution environment that helps achieve three things:

• Achieving Execution Integrity

On considering devices like processors, TEEs can aid in providing execution integrity when they have to multi-task and run concurrently. That is, one process wouldn’t affect the other one; the processors cannot interfere with one another.

• Providing a Secure Storage

Once data gathered by the processors are ready to be transmitted to other devices, the data has to be encrypted, needs to be stored securely. TEEs can secure data accordingly.

• Providing Remote Attestations

In addition to execution integrity and secure storage, TEEs can help verify that the output the programme produced with the data inputs is computed correctly.

Watch Dr Chang’s tech talk here!

How Remote Attestations Work and Why they are Important

Given how remote attestations provide this verification is done via the use of a public key and a private key to make sure that the process/programme that is being executed is what is intended.

For example, consider that a programme ‘PE’ is working on some data ‘x’ in the TEE to produce an output. With public-key technology or cryptography, the private key can be used to produce proof. Following this, a verifier can verify that the output in this programme is computed correctly. TEEs are environments that will not allow even the owners of the devices to compromise the data that is processed and gathered on the TEE.

Previously, the requirement for Remote Attestations/TEE was first introduced in a niche — digital wallets, digital rights protection,. To put that into perspective, a DVD player would not pay unless it was paid and purchased; certain software won’t run unless you have the right to run that software. However, in time, we found that, actually, it can accomplish more than just this. That is — privacy-preserving computations.

Privacy-preserving computations

Technologies like AI provide data sharing options to enable better decision-making processes. However, in several cases, there are several factors that restrict two parties from collaborating entirely, sharing data with each other due to privacy that prevent the release of several kinds of information. For example, enterprises will not share customer data to protect their privacy. So, in this case, the task lies in finding a mechanism where a certain party, like an enterprise — in this case, can analyse the data that they’ve gathered and yet, reveal nothing about their own data. This is what privacy-preserving computations cater to.

This can be achieved with secure multi-party computations, and they ensure three major functions:

• Maintains confidentiality
• Prevents leakage of data
• Ensures that data is computed correctly

There are other concepts like zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP) that can achieve this as well. But a major drawback lies in the overheads incurred in terms of computational costs that are very high. However, we can still achieve privacy-preserving computations by using hardware, we can achieve a similar effect. Here are certain caveats you will need to keep in mind.

• Since we rely on the hardware protections, the root of trust lies in with the manufacturers of the hardware products.
• The design is complicated for both hardware devices and software and the code is enormous. Due to this, we cannot make sure that this is implemented correctly. It has been found that there are chances of implementation flaws that cause side-channel leakage.
• Trust zones are not easily accessible. It is only accessible for the vendors ( Samsung, Huawei, Apple) and not the developers.

Blockchains don’t directly provide data confidentiality, but TEEs can help!

Blockchain can provide transparency, however, they cannot provide data confidentiality, and there’s no mechanism to provide computation confidentiality and a means to verify that the computation is correct.

What if we put TEE and blockchain together?

• Improve the throughput or performance of the blockchain platform and the consensus protocols.
• Blockchains and trusted execution environments can be used to provide privacy-preserving services.

What new applications or solutions can blockchains and TEEs provide?

In cases where blockchains cannot preserve the privacy and the confidentiality of the data inputs, TEEs can enhance the situation with remote attestations.

Within a TEE, with the help of remote attestations, the secure enclave can produce a piece of information for proof that can be sent to the smart contract. The smart contract can then verify the computation. To put this into perspective, heavy computations can take place off the chain and the output can still be applied to the smart contract which in turn will be verified in the smart contract environment. Contractual enforcement can be carried out accordingly.

Application of TEEs and Blockchain in a Marketplace for Computations

The data will be encrypted, decrypted in the enclave after the result is computed, and create an output that is further encrypted. This can be pushed back to the smart contract for subsequent operations.

Example: In a marketplace for computations, similar to Uber or Airbnb, where computation-based problem statements/jobs are disseminated to people who will get paid for providing solutions, TEEs and blockchains can help preserve privacy in the face of anonymity. Here’s how

This issue here lies in hiring remotely-placed workers to solve problem-statements and safeguarding the confidentiality of the data called input confidentiality.

The solution lies in encrypting and shared decrypting the information when the person hired gets the task with the help of TEE isolation and secure memory.

Additionally, here’s how a marketplace for computations can be secured with blockchain and TEE:

• The integrity of the output can be verified with remote attestations.
• The automated enforcement of contractual agreement can be executed by the smart contracts.
• A mechanism for fair pricing according to computation cost can be done via trusted metering in a TEE.

The Takeaway

Dr Chang’s tech talk brought together two technologies — TEE and blockchain, that could build hybrid applications to maintain data confidentiality and provide an immutable and transparent ledger. The scope and potential that this combination holds can really take us forward towards building a trustless environment.

Look out for more from Genesis DevCon.

Chang Ee Chien — Combining Trusted Execution Environments and blockchains was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Supply chain industry use cases in the realm of blockchain technology are ones that are most relevant. of those perfect-fit ones. At Genesis DevCon, we couldn’t help but put together a panel of veterans who are a part of this technology cusp. Blockchain technology being a transparent, decentralised, immutable, traceable ledger, can really revolutionise the supply chain industry.

Here’s a glimpse at the conversations that saw at the panel discussion on blockchain and its applications in the supply chain industry.

Get to know the panel:

Sanjeev Narsipur — Managing Director, Accenture

Raghavendra Deshmukh — Director — Blockchain, SAP

Jayasankar Pillai — Associate Partner, IBM

Moderator: Mohan Ramaswamy — Co-Founder, Terrago Logistics Pvt Ltd

The relevance of supply chain as a blockchain use case

The supply chain sector is one that could easily adopt blockchain technology into its tech infrastructure.

Mr Raghavendra Deshmukh began by stating that the supply chain involves several parties within a network and there are several aspects that could go amiss. Therefore, blockchain technology provides the required visibility and transparency in a supply chain to address this issue of managing a network.

Mr Sanjeev Narsipur added that there are three broad use cases in the supply chain:

• The tracking and tracing of the movement of goods
• The provenance of the goods
• Trade finance and supply chain finance

However, there are horizontal use cases among these three broad use cases that will bring out the practicality of blockchain. This lies in managing the Identity of the goods and managing the flow of payments. Broadly speaking, the supply chain itself, identity, and financial services are all interconnected. These aspects make the supply chain application more realistic.

Building trust and transparency in a multi-party system

One of the biggest drawbacks in the adoption patterns of blockchain tech in the supply chain sector lies in how the ROI is not determined for applying blockchain in the technology mix. Mr Pillai pointed out that from an ROI perspective, you need to have revenue coming in based on subscription revenue from new players. This will drive the value for adding blockchain.

Following this, he added, there is a cost take-out and a complexity reduction part and these are the factors that are usually sought out to determine the value-add. The need for a transparent system and one that maintains data integrity is part of these two factors. Therefore, you need to have sustainable revenue coming out to make the use case successful. The lack of such deliberation contributes to the failure of several implementations.

Watch the entire panel discussion on supply chains and blockchains here,

Organisational challenges in implementing POCs or scaling-up of a model

While implementing blockchain-based models in the supply chain ecosystem, there are several organisational challenges that you will need to overcome. With reference to cross border transactions, there are government and semi-government bodies that are involved in the supply chain landscape. The challenges of bringing these organisations to adopt blockchain are many as they cannot wholly adopt into one single network as they are approached by several parties who request for customised usage of these networks.

Mr Narsipur brought the incentivisation aspect into the picture. In public and private blockchains, methods of Incentivisation are different and in some cases, cryptocurrencies are not an option. He also added that another challenge is that blockchain is still in its nascent stages. Interoperability is a factor that stands in the way of adoption. Given that supply chain is an expanse of activities, the entire system may not use a single kind of a blockchain, and to put that into perspective, if various functions in the supply chain are running on several blockchains, then there must be a point where all these systems can be interoperable.

In addition to the interoperability issue, Mr Pillai added that not all parts of the supply chain are susceptible for blockchain. He illustrated this fact with an example involving Nestlé. When Nestlé came out with food pressed products in the line of infant food, they added a blockchain layer to their supply chain because it was a high-profit margin item. Notably, tracing the provenance of the product and giving transparency to it was important to the nature of this product. However — he added, in the case of Milo, they wouldn’t need to implement blockchain because if it were traced back to its source, it would be to a certain trader in the market. In addition to this, incentivisation is also relative.

Emerging technologies enable the blockchain environment

Apart from blockchain, emerging technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI), and 5G are being implemented into the supply chain ecosystem. The panel also discussed how the culmination of these technologies can enable a robust and efficient system for supply chains.

Mr Deshmukh added that IoT enables a blockchain environment. He shared his experience at SAP where they implemented a cold-chain track and trace. The transportation engineers where laden with the responsibility to ensure that the goods were levied in good condition. To materialise accountability, the transportation engineers were levied with certain penalties if the goods were below a certain temperature, indicating that the goods were spoilt.

However, he added that data recorded in the blockchain depends on the quality of the IoT devices. In order to tackle his situation, you need to make a certain set of assumptions about trusting the device and the availability of the information.

Given the importance of gathering data on a supply chain, Mr Narsipur brought an interesting concept into the picture. In order to track and trace the physical logistical environment of the supply chain, there needs to be a digital counterpart of the same. The concept of a digital twin is something significant at the conjecture of blockchain and other technologies. IoT enables the creation of these digital asset identities on the blockchain.

For AI to be implemented on the blockchain, you need to be certain that the data is trustable therefore the provenance of data needs to be verified before it is added to a blockchain. The architecture pattern which is emerging right now is such that if you can implement AI and run analytics on a certain data based in a blockchain, the outcome will be good. This is based on the fact that you can trace data provenance.

5G tech will provide the speed needed to expedite these processes given that there will be multiple networks that function in this space. Mr Narsipur concluded that these solutions, by themselves will not achieve much compared to what they can accomplish together.

Even though these technologies might seem very implementable, AI is not so prevalent in the supply chain industry because of two reasons:

• Data collected on a blockchain happened within a distributed network. This means that the data is not shared evenly.
• There are no set regulations and standards for data management and ownership in the blockchain.

Without some parameters, there will be several issues that arise from that the lack of regulations will not solve.

Regulation in the realms of blockchain and supply chain

Given how the movement of data and integration of several technologies comes into the picture, a set of standards and regulations is essential for the applications of emerging technologies in the supply chain sector. However, blockchain regulations are still a work-in-progress.

Mr Narsipur brought up an interesting point that circumvents the lack of clear-cut blockchain-based standards and regulations. He stated that as opposed to the regulations for blockchain technology, there are industry recognised regulations and standards set to deal with data. Example: Pharma Serialisation — that requires assets moved in a supply chain to have a digital identity — is a mandate in the EU. Blockchain could be a technology that could implement these regulations via identity management and hold parties to adhere to it.

He also shared the example of MOBI (mobility, open blockchain initiative) — is a consortium that is setting industry standards and regulations for the auto mobile industry. They are exploring parameters to define how acting partners in the automobile ecosystem can share data, manage and act on data in a blockchain ecosystem.

Enterprises contributing to government regulations

Enterprises play an important role in helping governments understand what needs to be considered while creating frameworks for technologies in blockchain.

Mr Deshmukh gave us some insight into how SAP participated in number of transport alliances. They worked with BiTA — Blockchain in Transport Alliance — and several trucking companies across Europe to explore the applications of blockchain technology to enable regulation in the space. SAP is also working to create better GS1 standards — standards set to improve the efficiency of supply chains across physical and digital channels — in the Pharma sector, to regulate the inflow of spurious drugs that are in the supply chain.

Note to developers who are BUIDLING for Supply Chain

Dr Pillai stated that developers need to keep in mind that the real ROI needs to be ascertained along with a method for incentivising the various parties in the network. Without an ROI, it becomes difficult to bring your use case into production.

Mr Narsipur stated that developers should try not to force-fit blockchain for the sake of novelty. It is important to explore the use case, the ROI blockchain will bring before adding it to your mix before trying to figure out what platform you will BUIDL on. He also added that developers need to take the time to find the best operating model which also determines the governance model for the network that includes all the partners.

Mr Deshmukh stated that blockchain is a network game. He advises developers to start with smaller networks within the supply chain to test the viability of the network, ensuring that you are adding value. He also added that developers or entrepreneurs need to understand the business model, figure out if a value-based pricing model is applicable. He added that smart contracts are still evolving, and that developers need to be aware of the platforms that you use to add them to your mix.

And that’s a wrap!

The panel discussion at Genesis DevCon brought out some important points on how the supply chain industry is implementing and adopting blockchain to enhance transparency and traceability. The stellar panel definitely gave us a first-hand account of how blockchains are going to revolutionise the supply chain sector.

To summarise the talk, here’s what we learned:

• If you’re stepping into the supply chain landscape with blockchain technology, ensure that it is not a use case that force-fits blockchain.
• Figure out the ROI for blockchain implementation.
• Industry standards and regulations are shaping the way blockchain can be implemented in supply chains well before blockchain regulations have been set.
• IoT, AI and 5G technologies working in Tandem with blockchains can revolutionise the supply chain industry as we know it

Read more about how blockchain is being adopted and implemented in India from another insightful discussion at Genesis DevCon.

Realising the challenges and opportunities in implementing and adopting blockchain to enable… was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Genesis DevCon featured some well-accomplished proponents of blockchain technology, one of whom was Yanislav Malahov, the founder of Æternity — a new blockchain protocol designed to deliver unmatched efficiency, transparent governance and global scalability.

As a Blockchain thought leader and a veteran in the blockchain space ,Yani and Æternity have done much to build and expand the blockchain ecosystem in Europe as well as Asia through partnerships, meet-ups, accelerators and other community building activities.

Æternity’s Outreach in Europe

The Æternity crypto foundation has been a key factor in developing the blockchain ecosystem in Liechtenstein, a German speaking principality near Austria. Liechtenstein’s parliament has Unanimously passed the Blockchain Act, to take effect from 1 Jan 2020, Essentially becoming the first country to have a comprehensive regulation for the token economy.

Æternity Universe One, a conference held in Prague in September 2019, was a common platform for hundreds of Blockchain developers, researchers, designers, entrepreneurs and enthusiasts to explore blockchain, its use cases and its future.

Æternity Ventures , the Investment arm of Æternity, launched their Starfleet programme. The Æternity Starfleet programme is a full fledged accelerator programme for startups and entrepreneurs utilising the Æternity blockchain. The Starfleet programme offers mentorship, go to market partners, and even funding worth 100K USD. The Starfleet programme launched in Sofia Bulgaria and is planned for Malta(Dec 2019) as well as India in 2020.

The Æternity Blockchain

Æternity seeks to build a new, better society that fuels sustainable growth and with unprecedented transparency through all aspects of society. To achieve this goal Æternity has built a next generation, scalable , decentralised and open source blockchain platform for more smart contracts and “æpps”.

Scalability being a common problem in the blockchain domain, Æternity provides a more scalable option through the usage of state channels (a channel off-chain that allows users to communicate and transact privately, thereby reducing the On-chain load), with weighted, delegated and transparent governance all wrapped up in an efficient smart contract language called Sofia.

A smart contract is only as good as the language it is written on and unlike common languages today that were written by enthusiasts and developers, Sofia was written by experienced programming language creators with the objective in mind that the contract execution must be safe, efficient,cheap and have the ability to scale. It is an ML dialect , operates functionally like Ocaml and it’s syntax resembles that of Reason.

FATE or the Fast aeternity Transaction Engine is a superior virtual machine with easier safe coding, faster transactions and smaller code sizes (10x) than traditional bytecode virtual machines on other platforms. FATE was custom built to seamlessly integrate with the functional smart contract language Sofia.

Salient Features of the Æternity Blockchain

Governance

Æternity enables truly democratized governance by implementing delegated and weighted voting. This form of voting not only ensures that the value of the vote Is weighted by the number of tokens owned but also allows delegation of voting rights.

Oracles

Oracles are known as sources of information that can be found on the blockchain. These sources of information may validate their data or let their reputation determine the reliability of their source.

Æternity naming system (AENS)The Æternity naming system offers the assignment of names to point to accounts that can be used to transfer ownership of tokens. This naming system increases usability , utility and simplicity.

Tokenization

Æternity predicts a future where the tokenization of all shared assets and resources is commonplace. Every co-owned object and shared resource will be tokenized and it’s ownership and access tracked by the blockchain. This would ideally make all shared assets more liquid and traceable on global markets. Æternity strives to achieve this degree of tokenization that would lead to a huge upgrade in the efficiency of global society.

The Decentralised future with Yanislav Malahov, The Godfather of Ethereum was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Blockchain and it’s adoption by startups

With all the benefits of the very enabling blockchain tech , it’s no wonder why startups clamour to adopt blockchain tech and it’s innovative, industry-agnostic uses.

Moreover, this is the Era of the Startup culture in India, and it couldn’t be a more opportune moment to partake in the startup culture. With the government providing support with the Make In India and Startup India initiatives the only hindrance becomes the availability of a viable and Innovative Idea that adds value to the system.

We, at Genesis DevCon, put together a panel of experts in the domain, Founders and CXOs alike, from some of India’s best blockchain Startups. Members of the panel were : Jayanti Kanani — CEO and Co-Founder of Matic Network, Vikram Nikkam — CEO and Co-Founder of InstaCrypto, Mayur Relekar — Founder of Newfang, Nilotpal Mukherjee — CBO at Marlin Protocol, Moderated by someone with a knack for All things Crypto and Everything Blockchain, the host and founder at Hard Fork, Mr Shantanu Sharma

Let’s get to know the panel

Jayanti Kanani is the CEO and Co-Founder of Matic Network, A network dedicated to bringing massive scale to Ethereum using an adapted version of Plasma with PoS based side chains. With a team passionate about decentralisation, they aspire to see a world where Blockchain is a mainstream concept and anyone can interact with the ecosystem without worrying about its complexity.

Vikram Nikkam is the CEO and Co-Founder of InstaCrypto, an easy, simple and fast way to trade in crypto. InstaCrypto provides its users with the highest degree of security, privacy and autonomy by granting the users complete ownership of their cryptocurrency because InstaCrypto never holds their private keys, unlike other exchanges,

Mayur Relekar is the Founder of Newfang, a new decentralised cloud storage platform for dApps, powered by the EOS Blockchain. Newfang offers its users faster content serving stream video faster, by utilising edge computing and a decentralised network of storage nodes.

Nilotpal Mukherjee is the CBO at Marlin Protocol, a startup that aims at improving speeds across multiple blockchains by utilizing a “Bandwidth sharing marketplace”.

Shantanu Sharma is the host and creator at Hard Fork, India’s first Crypto and Blockchain TV Talk show where he interviews some major proponents of the blockchain ecosystem about their journey and outlook on blockchain , with significant experience in a wide spectrum of this industry Shantanu Sharma sparked some insightful discussions.

Some salient points of the discussion

This discussion centred around what it’s like to be a startup in the blockchain ecosystem and what kind of attitude one should possess while building a blockchain startup.

What makes a good startup idea?

The general consensus of the discussion was that it takes passion, grit and undying perseverance to really make your startup soar in the Industry. (as was displayed by the fine participants of this discussion).

Vikram Nikkam explained that a good startup idea is often-times a good improvement to an existing process eg. an improvement in speed or reduction in cost. Nilotpal from Marlin added that it could also be a good solution (latent or otherwise) to an existing problem. Jaynti Kanani also pointed out that in addition to all this there has to also be a natural Idea-Founder fit.

The next step? Building a team.

After identifying a viable idea, it is now time to execute this idea. The first step of which is identifying a competent team to help build the idea.

Vikram believes that the best way to find people of like-mindedness is to host meetups around a particular subject and network with the people that show up. ( Meetup.com makes this easier). Nilotpal Mukherjee stressed on the need for the personalities to be a fit. He added that since the first few people that you hire would impact your startup the most, they should be chosen with extreme care ie. to be judged based on not only their skill set but also their personalities. Jaynti Kanani also added that Twitter is a great way to reach people.

The team is ready. How soon do I need to take a product to market?

Nilotpal enlisted numerous factors to keep in mind while setting this goal, like the investors, the market’s acceptance, competitors and capability but with all this, in mind, he says that the underpinning needs to be strong, regardless of how long that takes. Mayur from Newfang added that in addition to speed, agility — in this case, the ability of your team to make the right decisions at the right time — is also something to keep in mind before taking your product to market.

How does one motivate themselves and their teams to commit?

Vikram pointed out that a good way to keep yourself motivated is to keep a track of the progress you have made no matter how small. Jaynti kanani personally follows a regimen of meeting a favourite mentor once a week or month just to talk and let out the stress. Mayur added that to keep your motivation from taking a hit, one must develop a “thick skull and thick skin” and not shy away from interacting with users and taking feedback impersonally and objectively.

Shantanu also pointed out that things become smoother with the right mentor that fits the idea and significantly more so if the mentor also happens to be your investor.

The Startup is ready, is the Ecosystem in India ready?

Nilotpal elaborated that given any new technology and companies innovating using them , the bottleneck is always some form of regulation. He believes that it is the duty of indigenous startups that have gone the global distance to support future pipelines in building a more robust and flexible regulation around blockchain as numerous other countries have done in the past.

Shantanu added that colleges and educational institutes must be on the front-lines of adopting this technology to inspire innovation and awareness in young developers.

What it takes to be a Startup In the Blockchain Ecosystem -Genesis DevCon was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

With blockchain becoming a popular emerging technology, there are several enterprises and startups that are building solutions for real work problems on multiple blockchain platforms. This was implicit when Deloitte stated in one of its reports that executives are starting to ask about how they can implement blockchain as opposed to when they were sceptical about how blockchain will work for them.

Given the enthusiasm to explore the applications of blockchain in several business verticals, we decided to bring you a stellar panel of blockchain industry experts to share insights into the adoption and implementation of blockchain technology. Before we get into the insights, let us introduce you to these exceptional individuals.

Get to know the panel

1. Ravi Vyas
   Ravi Vyas is a well-established product person. His expertise is based on building products for several companies like YourStory, from the ground-up. Presently, he is heading a startup called NextStepHQ as the CEO and Co-founder.
2. Rajesh Dhuddu
   Rajesh Dhuddu is the Global Practice Leader at Tech Mahindra and is responsible for advocating Blockchain led solutions for clients. He has more than two decades of experience in Payments, FinTech, Telecommunications & Business Process Management. Rajesh is an active speaker in forums like CII, NASSCOM, CeBIT, Tedx, ASSOCHAM, and IOTx to name a few. He is also a Mentor for Startupbootcamp FinTech, Mumbai and Everwise.
3. Gokul Alex
   Gokul Alex is one of the best-known names in the Indian blockchain ecosystem, a reputation earned through his work with several overseas blockchain projects. He is the Chief Architect for Blockchain Practice in the Government and Public Sector in PwC India.
4. Mahesh Narayanan
   Mahesh Narayanan is the principal product manager at Microsoft and has over 20 years of experience in the enterprise domain. Mr Mahesh also has expertise in blockchain, private cloud, data centre networking, hyper-converged infrastructure, network security, and cloud-based monitoring and analytics systems.
5. Manish Jain
   Manish Jain comes with vast experience in leading global companies across industries shape their digital strategy, harness Big Data for business value, and deliver digital technology-driven solutions. His expertise is spread across Consulting Practice Development, Account Management, International Experience, and Transformation Excellence. He has applied these skills across various technology verticals that include blockchain and AI.
6. Suresh Ponnuswamy
   Suresh Ponnusamy — the new CTO of Eleven01. He is a veteran developer and an architect with a deep understanding of Information Technology and has the experience that will help Eleven01 continue its pursuit of building a robust blockchain protocol.

5 Interesting points about Implementation and Adoption of blockchain technology in India

1. Blockchain ≠ Bitcoin
   Mahesh Narayanan expressed that the token economy or cryptocurrencies as digital assets, are a technology by themselves. They are backed up by blockchain technology in the backend.
   There needs to be a clear distinction between the implementation of blockchain technology by itself and Bitcoin (and other cryptocurrencies). With the misconception that blockchain is limited to Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, enterprises and startups will be limited a certain set of usecases like finance. This needs to change. Rajesh Dhuddu pointed out that public relations (PR) in blockchain needs to be focused on this aspect.
2. Public sector usecases will fuel large scale adoption
   There are several governments from around the world who are using blockchain technology to enable their citizens with better services. This will surely drive large scale adoption and implementation of blockchain technology.
3. Overcoming challenges to enterprise adoption
   Presently, most enterprises are not adopting blockchain platforms and adding them to their technology mix because of the lack of efficient services. To elaborate, most enterprises are finding it hard to move from their legacy systems or suffixing blockchain into their technology mix due to lack of service that can enable the same. Addressing this issue will change the way blockchain technology is implemented into legacy systems.
4. Business Consortia can influence the adoption of blockchain technology
   Manish Jain pointed out that enterprises will be encouraged to implement blockchain in their technology mix if they are led by example and business consortia can be the answer here. When enterprises can work within trusted ecosystems, they can create positive influences based on the outcome of adopting and implementing something — blockchain technology, in this case. This can urge enterprises to explore how blockchain can enhance their services.
5. Liberating cryptography from the centre to the margins
   Given that we have heard about discussion points about adoption and implementing blockchain technology, Gokul Alex added a perspective to what the impact of adopting and implementing blockchain means. The vision of Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator(s) of Bitcoin, was to give cryptography back to the people. The technology was limited to use by the military and other governmental bodies. However, now cryptography can be pursued to address business usecases and provide solutions to other real-world problems through blockchain.

In Conclusion

The blockchain adoption and implementation panel at Genesis DevCon was one of the most relevant conversations that elucidated what challenges the early adopters of blockchain technology are facing. They also touched upon how blockchain can impact the creation of better services and more opportunities that still lay unexplored.

This was the true intention of a developer conference such as Genesis DevCon: to enable first-hand learning of what this niche, emerging sector truly holds for its stakeholders.

Look out for more on the conversations and discussions from Genesis DevCon.

How the adoption and implementation of blockchain technology in the Private and Public sector was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.

Zero Knowledge proof is a very intriguing concept in the cryptography domain as far as Blockchain is concerned. The concept of ZKP (Zero Knowledge Proof) is slightly challenging, in that It seeks to provide proof that an entity possesses some information, without actually giving the information away.

Transparency is one of the key features of blockchain technology, But some of the uses of blockchain tech deal with very sensitive information, like those in the Banking, Insurance and Medical industries. When dealing with such sensitive information Zero Knowledge Proof becomes a necessity because the trivial method of sharing the information, as a demonstration of proof of possession, is no longer feasible. In such cases, Transparency takes a step back to allow for greater security and privacy.

Typically any proof of knowledge involves a prover and a verifier with whom the knowledge is shared. Implementing Zero Knowledge Proofs in such concerns would completely eliminate the need to make public or share any financial, medical or personal information with the verifier as ZKP enables blockchain transactions to be validated without revealing the identity of the users making the transactions.

At Genesis DevCon, we had a star-studded set of experts speak about Zero Knowledge Proof and Security in blockchain as a larger umbrella. Dr Satya Lokam, A senior researcher at Microsoft started off his introduction to ZKPs with a witty little example of Akbar and Birbal to elaborate on the concept and went on to describe why ZKP needs to be incorporated and it’s consequent benefits. Mr Pankaj S Dayama , Head of Blockchain Solutions at IBM , also chimed in on day 2 of DevCon with the history & progress of ZKPs and the practicality of their use in blockchain applications.

Meanwhile, Dr Souradyuti Paul, an associate professor at IIT Bhilai , gave us an academician’s perspective on the conventional issues in blockchain security along with the fairness properties and anonymity problem of Bitcoin.

Stay tuned for more updates and announcements about what transpired at Genesis DevCon!

Surveying Blockchain Security and Zero-Knowledge Proofs with Expert Researchers at Genesis DevCon was originally published in IBC Media on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.