Some Definitions

Blockchain

1. A blockchain is a distributed database.
2. A blockchain maintains a continuously-growing list of ordered records called blocks.
3. Each block contains a timestamp and a link to a previous block.
4. Once recorded, the data in a block cannot be altered retroactively. (By design blockchains are inherently resistant to modification of the data.)

Blockchains are secure by design and an example of a distributed computing system with high byzantine fault tolerance. Decentralised consensus can therefore be achieved with a blockchain. This makes blockchains suitable for the recording of events, title, medical records and other records management activities, identity management, transaction processing and proving provenance.
This offers the potential of mass disintermediation and vast repercussions for how global trade is conducted.

The first blockchain was conceptualised by Satoshi Nakamoto in 2008 and implemented the following year as a core component of the digital currency bitcoin, where it serves as the public ledger for all transactions. Through the use of a peer-to-peer network and a distributed timestamping server, a blockchain database is managed autonomously. The invention of the blockchain for bitcoin made it the first digital currency to solve the double spending problem, without the use of a trusted authority or central server. The bitcoin design has been the inspiration for other applications.

Double Spending

byzantine fault tolerance

merkle

trie

MARKET CAP

HASH RATE

References

Blockchain (database) Wikipedia