Goodbye File Cabinets. Hello Decentralized Record Keeping
How many of you have a file cabinet sitting around for records? Do you find it useful… or is keeping all those physical records more of a hindrance than a help?
Blockchain technology has the potential to totally rethink the way we interact with records. Bear with us for a minute here… we’re going to walk you through the riveting history of the file cabinet, and why decentralization is the answer to a problem you didn’t know we had.
From Revolution to Necessity
There was a time when filing cabinets were cutting edge technology. In the late 1890s, the filing cabinet came onto the scene and gained popularity quickly. When you think back to the organizational tools available at the time, it’s not really surprising.
Before the filing cabinet, if you wanted to store and retrieve vital information, you probably kept it in a cellar, safe or ledger. That’s all well and good… but what if you have A LOT of information?
As business and formal, modern economic systems began to gain steam in the world, it was more and more necessary to have easy access to information and records. For businesses, they’d need to keep customer records for growing regulatory forces and to understand a wider business scope than was previously possible. The advent of mail and telegraph communication brought more remote transactions, making complex balance sheets and receipts. As ownership systems became more formalized, you’d need to prove that you owned things more than with a single deed that entitled you to your whole estate!
So… file cabinets changed the world. Think of doctors, clerks, librarians, museum curators, lawyers — these people had tons of records. Their ability to access them quickly was directly related to their ability to accomplish more.
Fast forward 40 or 50 years after the second world war. A middle class is emerging as a majority of most 1st world countries, and they have an increasing amount of paper records. Printing developments made it easier for written documents and records to be provided to them, and they crammed them full of house deeds, wills, bank statements, voided checks, medical records, birthday cards… the list goes on.
See how fun it was to search for records in bound volumes before file cabinets with this list of 1700s birth records digitized by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania!
https://archive.org/details/recordofpennsylv00linn/page/782/mode/2up
That file cabinet that was such a boon to business soon became something that every person who had any sort of financial footprint needed to have in their house. The information in it wasn’t all vital, but there was stuff in there that could mean serious harm if they lost it… so file cabinets stayed important.
Into the Digital Background
File sharing, cloud storage and insanely cheap (relative to yesteryear) external storage abound today. Most people, however, still have that file cabinet in their house. That file cabinet may not be the shining example of technological progress anymore, but it still holds incredibly valuable documents.
Anyone who owns a house knows that there’s that packet you got at closing. We won’t blame you for not knowing what all is in there… but we all know that we need to keep it handy. Same with your car — your title is your certified proof of ownership. If you lose that, you’ll need a new one before you can register or insure your vehicle. Tax records have to be kept for years in case of an audit — business records even longer!
‘Wait a minute —’ you may be saying, ‘Some of those things aren’t paper anymore where I live!’. You’d be correct. In fact, most of those things will likely be transitioning away from paper records very soon. With it, your file cabinet will likely get a lot more roomy on the inside. This can make you feel like that big ugly piece of furniture is a waste of space, but also that the standardized and safe place that you’ve put your records your whole life is gone. Whatever will you do!?
The Future of Vital Storage
The file cabinet didn’t just give us a way to organize and retrieve information for over 100 years. It also gave us an absolutely essential way to keep records safe. File cabinets were a place to keep our sensitive information, usually behind lock and key in an office or our home. Newer file cabinets are even fire resistant to protect your records in the event of a disaster. So what happens with all our digital records in the event of an equivalent digital disaster?
Traditionally cloud storage just doesn’t cut it for sensitive records. Do you know what this year is? The worst year ever for cybercrime. Do you know what last year was? Also the worst year ever for cybercrime. And it goes on like that, back to when cybercrime became a thing. Do you really want your tax records or financial documents on a cloud service that’s only as secure as its practices?
Now it’s blockchain’s time to shine. Blockchains are essentially decentralized databases. Databases are the digital equivalent of a file cabinet in terms of organization, recall and storage. Like with file cabinets, information on a database can be tagged, grouped and referenced easily. Blockchain, however, brings new advantages that traditional databases do not.
A blockchain is decentralized. On most chains, there’s no central authority that you have to rely on to ensure security or access. The chain can be accessed without a centralized portal and validation occurs by consensus between users, meaning no one has to direct the blockchain per se, it just keeps functioning off of the established logic and the consensus of its users.
Blockchains are also secure, while still having public transparency. You could, for example, use a blockchain file system to prove that you have had a certain document in your possession for a given period of time without having to unmask what the contents of that document are. The blockchain itself can serve as proof of when and how files are changed without actually giving away what those changes entail unless you have the document in hand to reference. In short, a blockchain can provide the same chain of ownership that physically possessing a document provides, while also creating a digital paper trail that proves possession and history as long as the document has been on the blockchain.
Mundane… but Massively Important
This may seem like small potatoes… but technological advancements sometimes feel that way until you think about all of their ramifications. There are hundreds of thousands of hours wasted in courts around the world every year to determine the validity of documents or to verify chain of custody. With a blockchain there wouldn’t be any reason to argue… all the data is there on the chain forever!
Again, it’s hard to say that this is the most glamorous or exciting use of blockchain technology… but it’s pretty dang useful. How we store and maintain necessary documents is ripe for disruption, and we do need a way that’s more suited to our modern situation.
We’ve all had all sorts of ideas for how blockchains could change the world. This one may not make headlines, but it’s important. The biggest changes don’t always seem like big changes until they totally alter the way we do business and approach life.
The future is bright… and maybe it involves getting that ugly file cabinet out of your house and office sooner rather than later.
