Australia’s NSW Tests Storing Driver’s License over Blockchain Tech

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by Eugenia Kovaliova · 3 min read
Australia’s NSW Tests Storing Driver’s License over Blockchain Tech
Photo: Service NSW / Twitter

Driving liscenses will soon become digital for the participants of a new trial set to be conducted across Sydney’s Eastern suburbs in November.

With the development of blockchain technology, more and more common things of everyday use are becoming digital. As it has recently been announced, the government of the New South Wales (NSW) in Australia will soon conduct a trial of digital driving liscenses.

The trial is set on November, 2018, when over 140,000 license holders in Sydney’s Eastern suburbs will get an opportunity to replace a traditional physical plastic card on a modern digital version of it, available via the Service NSW app.

The trial follows the last year attempt to digitize driving liscenses in Dubbo, when the participants got a chance to use their digital driver licence for proof of identity and proof of age to enter pubs and clubs, as well as to provide it for roadside police checks.

This year, the project will be powered by blockchain-based platform TrustGrid, the product of Australian data security company Secure Logic. The platform had been used to underpin the digital driver licence, enabling the state-wide roll-out of the digital identification play, with its tech used in both the Dubbo and the upcoming Eastern Beaches trials.

According to the company’s CEO Santosh Devaraj, digital driving liscenses are the tip of the iceberg, as he believes that modern technology will soon fundamentally change the way people interact with government:

“The era of standing in line to file government paperwork is coming to an end, as is our reliance on physical identification cards to establish your identity or proof of age with law enforcement or at licensed venues. These are mistake prone, time-consuming, expensive, and impractical ways to offer services.”

Being an advanced blockchain solution, which provides a secure, decentralised, and immutable ledger of transactions, the TrustGrid platform has a great potential to create new ways of storing private information, such as motor registration, birth and death certificates, medical records, property titles, as well as HSC, TAFE, and other academic results.

Devaraj commented:

“While it’s positive to see government pursue a platform that has the potential to save lives, people are right to be concerned about how their sensitive data is stored and could be exploited by hackers. Rather than a black and white method of opting ‘in or out’, TrustGrid could enable each individual to set the terms of their own digitised contract that governs exactly what personal information is disclosed through fine-grained consent and encryption policies.”

Australia is not the only example to implement these changes, it is becoming more and more common among the governments all over the world. In India, degree certificates are going to be issued on the blockchain, as well as birth certificates are being tested over the blockchain network. China continues working on powering their smart cities with the help of blockchain technology. Not so long ago, West African nation of Sierra Leone even held their Presidential elections over a blockchain network.

As the power of blockchain tecnology is becoming stronger and stronger, the number of traditional things turning digital continues to grow in progression.

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