MSPNetworks Blog

With the ongoing fascination with cryptoassets that started with the cryptocurrency boom, the term “NFT'' has popped up again and again in the headlines. We wanted to help provide some clarity into what an NFT actually is, and why they have been such a big deal as of late.

Let’s begin with a hypothetical situation.

Let’s Say You Attended an Art Auction...

… and, as you were sitting in the bidder’s gallery, the original Nyan Cat GIF was put up for sale. You know, the cat with the toaster pastry body that travels the night sky propelled by a rainbow. You know, the image that can easily be obtained through a simple image search, by anybody, whenever they want.

Now, let’s say that Nyan Cat was ultimately sold for about $561,000 USD… because that’s precisely what happened.

NFTs Have Allowed for the Sale of Digital Assets

This sale, and countless others like it, have been made possible by use of NFTs (short for non-fungible token), which are a cryptoasset much like cryptocurrencies are. The big difference is that, while cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin are fungible in that there is effectively no difference between Bitcoins, there are differences between NFTs… as their name would suggest.

Think of it this way: comparing Bitcoins (or other fungible tokens) is an apples-to-apples comparison. Comparing NFTs is more of an apples-to-ocean liners kind of situation.

Like cryptocurrencies, NFTs are powered by the blockchain, which means that each has its own record that effectively can’t be changed once it is created.

But What Is an NFT?

An NFT is effectively a seal of ownership, a token that stakes a claim to any digital asset. These tokens can be linked to anything digital—from images to articles to music to virtual real estate and beyond—to state that an individual owns that digital asset. Jack Dorsey, the founder of Twitter, sold his first tweet “just setting up my twttr" for almost three million dollars. 

NFTs can have different impacts, based on who you are in the transaction. For instance, a digital artist can set up a piece of their artwork with an NFT so they can more effectively sell their work (and potentially get a cut of all future transactions). Casual buyers get the bragging rights of owning an original work and some basic usage rights, while also supporting artists in the financial sense. Collectors can also buy NFTs on speculation, hoping that the value will rise so they can make a profit.

NFTs technically originated when the Ethereum blockchain added support for them, leading to the development of a game/online community called Cryptokitties. Basically, each Cryptokitty is its own NFT, and can be used with another kitty (and a payment to a miner) to breed another unique Cryptokitty. Similarly, another platform rose up that allowed participants to collect virtual rocks.

Are NFTs Going to Be “A Thing?”

Honestly, only time will tell at this point. While the technology is only peeking into the mainstream right now, there has been some support for NFTs exhibited. The band Kings of Leon’s latest (as of this writing) album was sold in the form of an NFT, with different tiers adding different bonuses. Groups of athletes have teamed up to provide fans with digital collections of memorabilia, and numerous brands (including Marvel, DC, and Star Trek) have taken to releasing digital statues of their popular characters.

However, it is also important to mention that NFTs contribute to the environmental stress that other power-hungry blockchain processes do, so this will need to be addressed before many will help to convert the NFT craze into a more sustainable marketplace.

In Short, Technology Can Be Really Confusing…

...and, while your business may not need to worry too much about digital art being sold for $69 million dollars, there’s plenty that you do need to concern yourself with. That’s where we can step in to help. Give us a call today at (516) 403-9001 to find out how we would, and can, help make your business’ technology a better investment than ownership of someone else’s tweet.

For a while there, blockchain was a buzzword that you would hear about constantly. It was the future of data security and secure online transactions. As 2020 has pointed our attention elsewhere, you’ve heard less and less about blockchain technology. Today, we’ll take a look at what some of the most innovative companies are doing with distributed encrypted networks,

What Is Blockchain? 

Blockchain was one of the most talked about technologies of the last half of the past decade; and while there have been hundreds of startups that use blockchain at the center of their offerings, there is some thought that the usability of the technology wasn’t as revolutionary as it was made out to be. For those of you who didn’t believe the hype, however, it should be noted that blockchain, the distributed ledger technology that provides unparalleled data security, transparency, and reliability, has been used as the basis of applications for financial services, real estate, law enforcement, supply chain management, insurance, and many more industries. 

The applications of this technology don’t end for cybersecurity, however. For the past several years the technology has been seen used in more and more practical applications.  You see, when you can depend on the reliability of information, developers will want to use it to enhance the ability to manage waste. Supply chain management is a great example. The more transparency a business can have with the products and resources on their supply chain, the more efficient their operations will be and the reliable their projections will be, allowing them to budget better and use the capital they would have otherwise wasted in advancing their company’s agendas.

How Some Industries Use Blockchain

The best way to see how blockchain has been integrated into software is to take a look at how companies utilize the technology.

Medical

If there has been one industry that has utilized blockchain technology the best, it is the healthcare industry. Some hospitals have already started utilizing the technology to help protect patient data. In healthcare there is a lot of information that needs to be both secured and simultaneously available, a complete conundrum for healthcare providers. Enter blockchain. Here is a technology with the ability to keep a transparent, yet incorruptible and private log of all patient health, insurance, and provider data; and, since it is decentralized, sharing the information that’s needed comes with fewer risks to patient profile info.

Banking

One industry that analysts were most curious about was how blockchain was going to affect the banking industry. Obviously, with the ability to keep transactions transparent and secure, the technology is perfect for the banking industry which, despite all the technological advancements over the past 50 years, hasn’t changed all that much. Today, banks are using blockchain as the basis for smart transactions that can be used to move money faster than ever. Banks are also partnering with various FinTech (financial technology) companies to create financial products that will seemingly revolutionize the way people and businesses can get the capital they need to push their initiatives forward.

Cybersecurity

Another obvious industry that is both quickly growing and in need of reliable instruments is the cybersecurity industry. Basically, companies are creating products that revolutionize the way people store their sensitive data. The distributed nature of blockchain is the impetus behind this shift. The less information can be gained from one location, the less likely hackers and cybercriminals will be to try and infiltrate. Moreover, with blockchain’s built-in encryption it has become a great option for access control systems and for data confidentiality as a whole. 

You may not be able to download a blockchain app and find any practical use, but the technology is here and is being used to secure large portions of sensitive data by companies from all over the world. If you would like to learn more about data security using blockchain technology, why not reach out to the IT professionals at MSPNetworks? Our experts can help you better understand what blockchain is and how you may be already using applications built with blockchain and didn’t even know it. Call us today at (516) 403-9001 to learn more.

Cybercrime has morphed over the past decade or so. With unbreakable encryption making breaking directly into a network all but impossible, phishing, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks, and other methods of indirect hacking have become en vogue. As a result, software companies are looking in some strange places to find building blocks for intrusion mitigation. One interesting emerging technology being used for this purpose is blockchain.

Developments in blockchain technology have begun to be stretched past keeping records and cryptocurrency. Today there are a couple companies using blockchain to create innovative cybersecurity solutions that aim to drastically reduce a company's exposure to cybercrime. No matter what vertical you work in, blockchain-integrated solutions have begun to pop up. Building new solutions with blockchain is incredibly popular nowadays, but is it just a buzzword used for its role in marketing, or is it making a discernible difference in these solutions?

Often thought to be “unhackable”, security professionals developing a blockchain-based cyber security platform isn’t all that noteworthy, until you realize how they are going about it. Developers have begun to create blockchain-based platforms that uses the distributed nature of the solution to power content delivery networks (CDN) and DDoS attack mitigation services. It does this by allowing users to rent out their spare bandwidth to use as security computing.

This will potentially reduce the ability for hackers to execute attacks, lower the cost for businesses to mitigate the effects of these attacks, and capitalize on their extra bandwidth. Other developers are using smart contract adoption to secure their interoperability and file security.

Is Blockchain Vulnerable?

Being a human invention, there have been some kinks in blockchain technology. For those of you who do not know how the blockchain works, here is a very stripped-down definition: Every transaction made through the blockchain, financial or contractual, is given a permanent, designated “block” in the chain. In order for it to be added to the ledger, the rest of the network (every other node) needs to approve this new block’s validity. Once it is added, it cannot be altered and provides an unchangeable record of the transaction. If a block needs to be changed, a new block would have to be entered. It is only then that the transaction is completed.

While this method may seem extraordinarily secure, this “unhackable” technology has its flaws. In 2018 alone just under one billion dollars' worth of cryptocurrency was stolen. Of the $927 million taken, $532.6 million of it was hacked from the Tokyo-based cryptocurrency company Coincheck where 500 million XEM coins up and vanished from the exchange.

Other Blockchain Vulnerabilities

To my surprise, one investigation found that some blockchain and cryptocurrency constructs has over 40 different vulnerabilities. Here are a couple:

51% Vulnerabilities

Many of blockchain’s vulnerabilities have more to do with the nature of the platform as well. One such vulnerability is known as a 51% vulnerability and is associated with mining cryptocurrencies. Let’s assume you are a cryptocurrency miner and you accumulate hashing power that exceeds more than half of what the blockchain contains, you could leverage a 51% attack to manipulate the blockchain to your own advantage.

Obviously popular blockchains, typically associated with renowned cryptocurrencies, have too big of a price tag to be practical targets for such a hack. Less expensive coins, however, are, and can be lucrative targets for hackers. In 2018, 51% attacks were leveraged against new cryptocurrencies, netting the attackers the equivalent to approximately $20 million.

Security of Private Keys

Using a blockchain requires a user to have a private key to unlock the naturally encrypted platform. Naturally, if this key were to be stolen, the thief would be able to access the user’s blockchain. What’s worse, because the blockchain is decentralized, these kinds of actions are difficult to track and, as designed, harder to undo.

It’s hard to forget in this world that is completely integrated with technology that some tech is just in its infancy. Blockchain, especially outside of the cryptocurrency sphere is only emerging and the tech built with it should be looked at through skeptical eyes. Stay up to date with the latest technology concerns and information, subscribe to MSPNetworks blogs.

Many industries depend on their IT working properly to function as intended, and healthcare is among them. Prior to 2009, information technology had failed to take root, but with the passing of the Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health Act (HITECH Act), the health industry is much more involved and reliant on IT than it has ever been before.

Electronic medical record technology is partially responsible for this rapid adoption, as it has made record keeping much easier for the healthcare industry. Since healthcare is quite a private industry, a system that can store patient and insurance data in a central location that can easily be accessed is critical to its success. This is one of the most important reasons why the healthcare industry suffers from some of the largest and most expensive data breaches out there, exposing countless medical and financial records for millions of patients.

Hoping to find a better way to keep data safe and secure from external threats, healthcare professionals are looking to alternative ways to store data so that it’s located in an environment where it is both secure and easy to distribute. When you take into account all of the other problems associated with healthcare, such as standards of care and rising costs, it’s clear that finding a way to keep data secure and accessible, while also not stifling innovation, is critical.

The Blockchain Might Be the Answer
An emerging technology called blockchain could be one of the best ways to solve the healthcare technology issues the industry is currently presented with. Many people know of blockchain as the tech that makes cryptocurrency possible, but it’s being looked at to solve a lot of issues associated with healthcare technology. The distributed ledger and technology behind it make it ideal for sharing information to a certain extent. Developers know that doctors, insurance agencies, and patients need access to this information, and the blockchain can provide this while guaranteeing data integrity. While it isn’t all great for the blockchain’s use in healthcare, there are various benefits that the blockchain can provide:

• Medical records: Once a medical record is completed, it is placed as a node into the blockchain. This effectively guarantees the authenticity of the record. The distributed nature of the blockchain allows the patient control over their medical and insurance information rather than have it be hosted by the care provider.
• Consent: Blockchain-based applications for consent management can potentially create a standard for these practices. A doctor or insurer might need access to records, so a patient can provide their consent through the blockchain as it’s needed.
• Medical rewards: Patients might be able to reap rewards and enjoy incentives for using this blockchain technology for their health records. This would be able to promote the solution to the rest of the industry, allowing for reduced costs in the long run.

While the blockchain might still be a developing technology, it could save the healthcare industry lots of time and resources in the future. What are your thoughts on these developments? Let us know in the comments, and be sure to subscribe to our blog.