Blockchain is a distributed ledger that uses data encryption.

If you are not very familiar with blockchain, or the whole concept seems queer to you, just think how overwhelming this phenomenon is, and you’ll see why millions of people already know about blockchain. The global market for blockchain was around USD $708 million in 2017, and is predicted to reach USD $60.7 billion by 2024. Persuasive enough to look at blockchain closer, isn’t it? Blockchain is a distributed ledger that uses data encryption to cypher all transactions within the system thus reaching the highest level of security the world has ever seen. All users within the system can verify transactions, but no one can delete any transaction record. In blockchain there is no intermediary that brings blockchain a serious competitive advantage if compared to a traditional banking system where a bank acts as a mediator between a sender and a receiver. Add here all spheres where data encryption can be applied, e.g. education, human resources management, judicial system management, etc., and you’ll easily understand why so many people nowadays call blockchain a revolutionary invention of the 21st century. As in this article we dare to call blockchain “a revolutionary invention of the 21st century”, let’s think what could also be called breakthroughs of previous years. The first thing which comes to mind is the Internet. The Internet brought a new epoch of information revolution to a technological world. Information revolution that resulted from the Internet is a revolution of mobility and quick data exchange that has become all-pervasive by present day. Today anyone can find any information after a couple of clicks that saves significant amounts of time, money and nerves. With the emergence of the Internet we saw geographical distance reduction, allowing people to enjoy communication while being physically distant from each other. All the above-mentioned only came true thanks to the Internet. Another great invention dating back to the 19th century was photography. For many centuries people had been trying “to stop the time” and catch precious moments applying various methods and techniques that only became possible thanks to combining several technical discoveries. The invention of photography provided humanity with a new revolutionary way of data recording and storage that facilitated the emergence of new arts such as videography, cinematography, etc. Since the photographic image allows objectively to record, essentially, all optical phenomena, including many of those that are beyond the sensitivity of the human eye, photography performs cognitive function in many branches of science and technology, e.g. spectography, astronomy, face-recognition… What unites all three inventions mentioned in this article is efficient data recording, storage and use, and a variety of fields where they can be applied. Thus, the principle guiding successful people in latest centuries “Who owns information, owns the world” has not lost its actuality to date.