Insights

Publication | ThinkSet

Blockchain Could Unleash Economic Growth

Kieran Brown, Michael Jelen and Nabil Manzoor

June 27, 2019

Blockchain has a trust problem. Or, at least, a perceived trust problem.

A decade after the ascents of Bitcoin and later Ethereum, the technology behind those cryptocurrencies—blockchain, a distributed electronic database that records and automates transactions—is still widely misunderstood among the public and even within boardrooms. It’s too often conflated with the unruly markets of cryptocurrencies, enveloping blockchain in a cloud of mistrust and confusion.

The perception that blockchain can’t be trusted is both unfortunate and inaccurate. It’s also preventing blockchain from achieving its potential as a technology that could radically improve transparency and security across a broad range of industries in the public and private sectors.

Getting past blockchain’s trust problem is the key to unlocking the technology’s enormous potential. And the best, fastest way to do that is through regulation and smart policymaking. That might sound like anathema to free-market hawks and cyberlibertarians, but proactive government involvement doesn’t have to be the government-dominated, centrally controlled nightmare they fear. Rather, it is the crucial ingredient needed to unlock this emerging technology’s potential, allowing innovation and business to flourish.