People often ask me about blockchain, especially since some aspects of what Secured2 does can sound similar. Also, compounded is the fact one of our seminal patents is the underlying 'decentralization' of today's modern blockchain (distributed data with key management). IBM owns the ledger patents when combined make up the blockchain. Also, IBM has filed 602 blockchain patents and was granted 260 blockchain patents to date. So in the future there will be a fight of who actually owns the blockchain but that's another post sometime in the future.
In this post, I'll explore the main problems blockchain aims to solve, why it's needed, and how we can transition to a more secure and efficient system. For those familiar with blockchain, this might cover some well-known ground, but for others, I aim to provide a straightforward explanation so you can leave with a clear understanding of what blockchain is—and isn't.
Let's start from the beginning. The Internet was created as an open protocol, designed to be accessible to everyone and initially used for transferring information between universities. Over time, it evolved into the vast, interconnected network we know today—a global system that underpins the world economy by facilitating communication, commerce, and more.
As we began conducting banking, e-commerce, and business online, we encountered a significant problem: security. How do you secure the Internet? This challenge led to the development of encryption technologies. Belgian cryptographers Vincent Rijmen and Joan Daemen created the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), a math-based algorithm that transformed readable data, or 'plaintext,' into 'ciphertext.' AES came in three strengths: 128-bit, 192-bit, and 256-bit keys. This elegant solution provided an illusion of security for a long time.
However, with the advent of exascale and quantum computing—capable of performing millions of quadrillions of calculations per second—the limitations of these math-based keys became apparent. They never truly guaranteed security, as math alone is about complexity, not foolproof protection.
As security vulnerabilities became evident, our financial systems urgently needed a more secure mechanism. This need spurred the development of new peer-to-peer technologies. Blockchain emerged to address issues of trust, transparency, anonymity, and security in digital transactions and data management.
To put things into a better perspective in the world before blockchain the challenge we have been fighting is 'sending something from point A, across the Internet, to point B and protecting not only the sending of information but the storing of information.' It's really that simple. So the big idea for blockchain was to create a ledger that records transactions across multiple computers (nodes) in a way that makes it difficult to alter or tamper with the information. Each block in the chain contains a list of transactions, and when a new transaction occurs, it is verified by a network of computers and added to a new block. Once the block is filled with verified transactions, it is added to the chain in a linear, chronological order. This process was thought to create a permanent and transparent record that can be viewed by anyone with access to the network. The only thing that makes this secure is math-based encryption, a distributed ledger consensus and automated verification. Can you see the problem yet? It all relies on math, third parties and massive hardware infrastructure to perform what should be a simple function.
So lets break this down into a very simple example. Imagine a notebook that everyone in your neighborhood can write in. Each page in the notebook represents a block, and each line on the page is a transaction. When the page is full, it gets stapled to the previous pages (forming a chain of pages), and a new page is started.
Now, whenever someone wants to make a change to a transaction, everyone in the neighborhood has to agree that the change is valid. If they do, the change is noted on a new page. This way, everyone has the same, unchangeable history of transactions that they can trust.
If you are like me you are probably asking a good question, why the heck would you ever want to have your neighborhood agree (we know nobody ever agrees), and also there is a risk that if you get enough people to agree one way (the wrong way) they can wreak havoc. Now you understand one of the many challenges and risks to blockchain. Basically he who controls consensus controls the outcome. Hack the consensus, hack the entire blockchain. Further - the entire foundation of blockchain sits on math-based encryption that is now quantum / AI vulnerable. So if you can't hack consensus you just hack the underlying encryption of the entire platform. Yes, blockchain is sitting on a house of cards and not even the NIST post quantum algorithms will save it.
So blockchain consensus faces challenges like 51% attacks (hacking consensus) by gaining control of 51% of the blockchain networks computing power, thus altering the blockchain. As well, we have the usual suspects of exploits in software, code vulnerabilities and phishing / social engineering. You get the point - it's vulnerable like anything else in this digital world but it's vulnerability is a little less than not having the blockchain if you are using today's math-based security.
Moving to a better and more secure modality:
Secured2 is a security technology designed to provide advanced data protection and privacy. It differs significantly from blockchain by focusing on how data is stored and transmitted, emphasizing data reduction and transformation methods to enhance security. The technology aims to make data breaches virtually useless to attackers by rendering the data unreadable without proper authentication and reassembly.
Key Features of Secured2
Data Transformation: Secured2 transforms data into a format that is unreadable and unusable to unauthorized users. This transformation makes it difficult for hackers to extract valuable information even if they gain access to the data.
Data Reduction: By reducing data to smaller, unrecognizable fragments, Secured2 minimizes the amount of exposed information during a breach. The fragmented data cannot be reconstructed without the proper tools and keys.
Dynamic Security: Secured2 employs a dynamic security model that constantly changes encryption keys and data configurations, making it more resistant to static attacks.
Non-Linear Storage: Data is stored in a non-linear fashion across multiple locations, adding an extra layer of complexity for potential attackers trying to piece together fragmented data.
End-to-End Encryption: Similar to blockchain, Secured2 uses encryption to protect data during transmission and storage, ensuring that only authorized parties can access and decrypt the information.
Comparing Secured2 to Blockchain
Feature | Blockchain | Secured2 |
Structure | Decentralized ledger of transactions | Data transformation and reduction technology |
Data Immutability | Once added, data is difficult to change | Data is constantly transformed, updated, and immutable |
Security Approach | Consensus mechanisms and cryptographic hashes | Data fragmentation, transformation, and quantum-secure protection from authentication, transport and at-rest |
Efficiency | Can be slow due to consensus | Fast, as it does not rely on consensus |
Data Privacy | Transparent ledger, open to all participants | Private and fragmented data, unreadable without verification and security guaranteed. |
Use Cases | Financial transactions, supply chain, etc. | Financial transactions, supply chain, communications, AI-security, secure data delivery and storage |
Why Secured2 is More Secure
Data Fragmentation: Example: Imagine a puzzle that, when put together, reveals a picture. Secured2 takes this picture, breaks it into many pieces, and stores each piece in different places. Even if someone finds some pieces, they can't make sense of them without knowing how to assemble them and having the missing pieces.
Advantage: This approach makes it extremely difficult for attackers to piece together the original data, even if they gain access to some fragments. We also mask and compress the image for even further obscurity and security.
Physics-based Security Measures: Secured2 utilizes the laws of physics to protect each piece of binary fragmented data while fitting inside today's standard's-based encryption. Secured2 provides the first and only patented physics-based data protection solution for guaranteed security.
No Single Point of Failure: While blockchain is decentralized, the integrity of the entire chain relies on consensus. Secured2 distributes data in a way that does not require consensus, reducing vulnerability to coordinated attacks like 51% attacks in blockchain.
Data Usefulness: Even if a breach occurs, the stolen data in Secured2 is useless without the keys and transformation logic. In contrast, blockchain data, while encrypted, is stored in a manner that could potentially be decrypted over time with enough computational power.
Conclusion
While both Secured2 and blockchain offer robust capabilities, they are designed vastly different. Blockchain excels in providing a transparent record of transactions, making it ideal for applications requiring trustless consensus. Secured2, on the other hand, focuses on protecting the data itself by making it inaccessible and unusable to unauthorized users, which is more suitable for scenarios where data privacy, security and confidentiality are paramount.
At the end of the day, all that matters is the ability to create, send and secure data no matter where it lives and ensure the appropriate parties have access to that data. That's what Secured2 does better than any company in the world!
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