Preparing for an Internet of Things future: In blockchain we trust (information-age.com)
Private blockchains, which allow only a preselected group of people to maintain the integrity of the ledger, can empower businesses to be more intuitive in the way they manage IoT devices.

Most businesses do not operate in silos, and have to abide by certain regulations or bodies of authority.

It’s not practical to reinvent every industry in the mould of Bitcoin, so permission-based ledgers may hold the key to scaling IoT sensibly, while all the while maintaining compliance with external structures.

Take agriculture for example. IoT is already helping to optimise supply chains and deliver smart logistics – tracking assets from a farmer’s field all the way to the shop floor through a web of connected sensors. Partnership with the blockchain, however, can take this one step further; guaranteeing food safety or ensuring the correct farm is given credit by hosting information on a living ledger.

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What’s more, farmers must abide to strict codes when it comes to what they can and cannot deliver to consumers, whether that be hygiene standards or conditions of livestock.In uploading a wealth of IoT data to private ledgers, a form of cryptographic auditing is ensured, broken down into simple inputs and outputs.

The joy of blockchain technology is that in coding the sensory data of machines directly onto the ledger, validity can be guaranteed from the first entry onward. In short, IoT and blockchain are self-reinforcing.

Preparing for the machines


Optimising current systems is one half of the story, preparing for the future remains the other. 68% predict we’ll see mass industry adoption of IoT within the next five years. One of the key battlegrounds is industrial IoT, and revolutionising how we manage supply chains and logistics.

IoT-enabled devices allow for real-time, predictive maintenance of machines, with the more devices connected to the network contributing to a smarter system. This, however, also raises threat levels, with each new connected device another potential entry point for attackers.

Connected devices have already altered the way businesses face up to security. There’s currently no uniform or overarching standard, so it’s up to individual businesses to take the lead.

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For those without the resources to design platforms with security in mind from the outset, it can often be an arduous task staying in control. Now imagine when AI becomes commonplace within manufacturing and the rate at which robots exchange data becomes exponential.

61 per cent expect robots to be a mainstay in IoT within a decade – private blockchains may just prevent future issues when interactions go beyond single-thread conversations and into multi-threaded ones between machines themselves.

Both IoT and blockchain technologies are here to stay. Their convergence is largely expected and the potential for them to benefit businesses is immeasurable.

On one hand, security concerns can be addressed by distributing information across the ledger; while on the other, IoT and blockchain can work together to disrupt many of the processes we have come to accept.

Private blockchains allow businesses to pick and choose the most favourable features of decentralised lists, and maintaining control in what is contributed to it at the same time.

The result, if managed correctly, could change the way we understand and utilise the IoT.

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 Sourced by Jamie Bennett, VP of Engineering, IoT and 
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    Francisco Gimeno - BC Analyst The convergence between Blockchain and IoT is here to stay. Each one helps the other to do growth and evolve. Together with AI and robotisation they form the pillars of the 4th Industrial revolution which we are starting to witness.