Shedding Light on Block-Chain

Technology has evolved over the years, throwing up disruptive capabilities within the polity as well as coming with interesting nomenclatures. One of such is what is  called “Block-chain”.

Chukwuemeka Fred Agbata Jnr, caught up with Oluseyi Akindeinde, Chief Technical Officer at Digital Encode recently on Tech Trends on Channels Television, to shed more light on what Blockchain is all about.
 
Oluseyi, the Chief Technical Officer at Digital Encode, is one of the leading tech guru in Nigeria.

Describing what block-chain is, Oluseyi explained that it is the latest thing on the internet and, in fact, the second most important thing after the emergence of the internet itself.

Block-chain, he explained, will have the same kind of impact that the internet had when it was first introduced. Block-chain was developed in 2008 by some guys who thought of how to further simplify online payment transactions.

One the practical use of block-chain, the first application of block-chain, Oluseyi stated, is the block-chain 1.0, which enables currency in digitized cash. In other words, the same thing you can do with physical cash, you can now do on the block-chain, according to him.
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The essence of block-chain is that it takes away the third party in an online financial transaction, thus, making the transaction possible between the buyer and the seller directly.

Before the advent of block-chain, the buyer and the seller used to transact their online financial business through trusted online traditional payment houses such as Paypal, VISA, MasterCard, etc, but now these third parties are removed completely from the transactions, Oluseyi reiterated.

Giving an illustration. Oluseyi said trading on the Stock Market, e.g., trying to sell your Shares on the Stock Market to someone else , will usually require you to seek the services of a Stock Broker or Registrar (third parties) in order for the transaction to sail through.

With block-chain, however, you can digitize the Share Certificate and the buyer too can digitize the cash and both of you can meet on the block-chain through a decentrslized exchange platform, peer to peer, to finalize the transaction.

All you need, stated Oluseyi, is a Laptop and Software, hence, the financial sector is already disrupted and will continue to be disrupted.

He agreed that the banks are not too happy with it as it’s already taking away some of their businesses, just as the Post Offices were not happy with the internet when it was first introduced as it took most of their jobs.

He, however, said there was nothing the banks can do about block-chain as it has come to stay. He maintained that since block-chain, like every other thing on the internet, is decentralized, there is no regulation on it. He stated that some countries, such as Tunisia has put their currency on the block-chain.

Oluseyi said that with block-chain bitcoin, you can make small financial transactions as the fee is usually a fraction of the amount being transacted instead of s huge fixed charge.

No cross-border or censorship fees are charged. He observed, in the final analysis, that, banks are now seeking ways of leveraging block-chain since they have seen that it has come to stay. You can watch the full length of the Interview here                

CFA is the Founder, www.techsmart.ng and Co-producer/Presenter,Tech Trends on Channels Television‎.