A huge announcement dropped into my newsfeed yesterday. Apparently, after the usual period of inactivity, German politicians realized that a solution for certifying vaccinations is required, after all. Quite a thing to realize over a year in a pandemic and in the midst of a vaccine rollout, but better late then never.
In a rather speedy and confidential quotation process the Cologne-based start-up Ubirch was chosen to provide the technology for the vaccination certificates. The Ubirch solution is already used in two counties and has a fully functional backend up and running. They will partner with tech giant IBM to develop frontend solutions and integrate local practices in their infrastructure.
Looking at the Tech
On vaccination, patients will receive a uniquely generated QR code. The generation mechanism uses variables like personal data, vaccine used, date of vaccination and a random number. This data is then used to create a random hash that is anonymized and will be stored redundantly on five different blockchains (not just any chains – we are talking Ethereum, Ethereum side-chains and the IOTA tangle here!). The source data for generating the hash will be stored in the QR code that you take with you but it will not be stored on the blockchain.
When being checked for your vaccination status, the inspector can compare the data imprinted in your QR code with your ID and scans code. If a corresponding entry exists on the chains, the vaccination status is considered positive. This way no personal data is stored anywhere on the blockchain, so nobody can read and abuse it, even if they managed to break the encryption.
Impact on Crypto World
What has until now been a sphere for risky investors and supply chain lighthouse projects is suddenly becoming reality for 83 million Germans no matter whether they know what a blockchain is or realize that they are using one. Assuming a 90% vaccination rate until the end of the year, this would mean that roughly 75 million Germans are going to have data stored on Ethereum and IOTA!
This project will soon prove that blockchain works, that blockchain is here to stay and that blockchain plays a fundamental role in providing trusted, verifiable and fraud-proof information.
And while “Otto Normalverbraucher” (the German cousin of John Q. Public) is getting excited about moving from paper vaccination certificates to QR codes, the crypto community is hyped about the sudden (government enforced!) mass adoption.
This is a re-published post from my account on the HIVE blockchain.
