Introducing Blockchain Street, a monthly walk into an emerging decentralized economy powered by the blockchain.

In this month’s Blockchain Street, we consider whether blockchain technology—a decentralized ledger technology which has been described as a ‘trustless technology’—can really solve the problem of trust in a centralized world. Walk with us …

Distrust is a major problem in transactions.

For centuries, man has always distrusted man. In our personal and public life, we don’t trust easily. Between kingdoms and fiefdoms, tribes and clans. Between slave merchants and slave agents. Between the church and the state. Between nations. Between the state and its citizens. Between Big Tech like Amazon, Facebook, Google,  and their users. Distrust reigns, even between a husband and a wife who each needs a marriage contract to trust the other to keep his or her vows; yet just about anything could still happen to that marriage. Anything. And today, there is increasing distrust between man and robots. Distrust is virtually everywhere. There is a problem of trust.

Trust is invaluable, and it is scarce. If trust were a commodity, people would chase it with lots of money. If trust were a currency, it would trump any other currency in the world. But trust is neither a commodity like gold nor a currency like the Naira or Dollar. Trust is an intangible, priceless value. It is so highly-demanded in the society—and increasingly so—that the business of trust today is a trillion-dollar industry. From accountants to lawyers, bankers to brokers, insurers to agents, the business of trust has become the innovation of middlemen or trusted third parties whose innovative solutions have continued to help parties essentially manage distrust.

To read more, download ‘Blockchain Technology: Can it really solve the problem of trust in a centralized world?’