How Can Blockchain Technology Be Used For Cybersecurity?

For almost a decade, blockchain technology has been around. In the beginning, it was formed as a means to exchange Bitcoin. However, with the globalization of this technology, it can be used for in a number of industries to accomplish various tasks. Among these, cybersecurity is among the top.

What is the blockchain?

Blockchains are networks that are distributed in nature with millions of active users. The blockchains make use of cryptography in order to secure the data which is contributed by the people connected to the network. Each member present on the network verifies whether the data being sent on the blockchain is real or note. This occurs via the public, private, and receiver key.

Once a piece of information or data gets certified, it forms a block which is added to the main network chain. In order to allow this, users contribute their computer’s power to solve complex problems. When a complex problem is successfully solved, a block is verified and gets added on to the chain. This block data cannot be removed from the chain and altered. This means that it exists on it forever as it is.

Differences vs. Regular Security

There are a number of differences between cybersecurity via blockchain and regular security on the internet. The prime difference is that in blockchain cybersecurity, the blockchain technology is used. As a result of this, for businesses, there is no intervention from humans in. the authentication process which reduces the risk of an attack vector.

Another difference to regular security is that in regular security, the passwords can be cracked with ease or can be stolen by employees in a company. However, by the use of blockchain cybersecurity, this is not possible.

Moreover, blockchains are designed in away that there is no central location for storage, and no one carries any authority over it. Hence, the data that exists on a blockchain cannot be altered by anyone. This is called decentralization. Hence in blockchain cybersecurity, a decentralized storage is used whereas,in regular security, there is no decentralization. Hence, one particular authority may have access to all of your information.

Since in blockchain cybersecurity, it is impossible to tamper the data that exists on the network, the data can never be leaked. In case anyone such as an attacker does attempt to alter the block, the blockchain technology runs a scan of the entire blockchain to see if a particular block is different from the others. Such a block immediately gets thrown out of the chain as it gets recognized as a false block. Whereas in regular security, no such technology exists and it is always prone to attackers.

Benefits to Cybersecurity

We have listed a number of benefits that blockchain has to cybersecurity. These include:

Prevention of access fraud

By using blockchain technology, access frauds avoided. A blockchain will prevent the data from getting altered or leaked out.

Blockchains can provide prevention from viruses and malware

Another benefit of blockchains is that they prevent the attacks from viruses and malware out of which DDoS attacks are the most common.

Blockchains do not allow data tampering

Since all the data is stored in the form of blocks on the blockchain, altering a block will simply exclude it out of the network chain. Hence, it is not possible to tamper with blockchain data or to steal it.