There is a lot of excitement for blockchain solutions within the government sector.  Government is however a large ship to turn and I do not believe it will happen quickly. The larger governments is already looking at applying this technology set in various ways.  The leading government in using this technology set is Estonia, who is running their whole country on a blockchain.  You can even apply for Virtual Citizenship of Estonia, as described in this [BBC News Article](http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36276673)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-I4rEX8s0l0
[Content Credit YouTube ascribe.io](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-I4rEX8s0l0)

### The United Kingdom recently released a detailed document on how the blockchain technology and crypto currency can be used within their country.

# Why is the blockchain technology set perfect for Government solutions?

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## Governance and Compliance

Enforcing governance on a nation-wide scale, is no easy job, and when we underpin governance, with the implementation of a distributed ledger, governance can be enforced by the rules, which will be set by the owners and participants of the specific ledger.  Very similar to the concept of a Free Society, with one difference, Government will build a framework of legislation,  to protect the society within the specific country.

## Security 
The days of bank robberies should be something of the past in the next few years, as in my opinion, most countries, will soon start their own crypto currencies, which should be bootstrapped by their existing currencies.  This is not good news for us that believe that there should be less control of currencies by the global elite, but that is a subject for another article. 

Although the bank robbery issue will be less, as again in my opinion, there should soon not be too many banks around, but it opens a new door for criminal activity as we all know.  The issue of computer hackers, gaining access to people's Crypto Wallets.   Look at the Bitcoin environment, although the distributed ledger or blockchain is very secure and non-hackable, many Bitcoin wallets has been penetrated in various ways.    Well, a blockchain might be vulnerable if an individual or an organisation could gain access to the majority of the processing power within the blockchain, but that would make the whole concept of a blockchain or distributed ledger obsolete.

## Privacy
One of the key aspects of a blockchain is that each individual using the blockchain has two different keys, a Public and a Private Key.  The private key is like having a pin code for a bank account electronic card.  The individual is therefor in total control of his or her privacy.  The public key is for information that can be allowed to be viewed by the public.  

##  Trust

I read an interesting piece on money the other day, which included an explanation on what money actually is.  It went something as follow.  A $10 dollar note, is an amazing thing, as when you hand the $10 note to somebody else, it immediately transfer the value of $10 to the new owner.  The person that receives the $10 automatically trust the person that provided the money, and never queries the value of the $10.  It provides trust by default as anybody in the world, knows that $10 is worth $10.  No questions asked.  Except, when it is a false bank note.  What the blockchain and crypto currency provides us, is the same **trust** aspect as what normal paper money provides.  The blockchain is what made cryptocurrency as trustworthy as a paper note.  For governments, this is huge, and they can now consider, providing e-currency or crypto currency to the same value as paper money.  

## Interoperability
This is a massive problem in all governments across the world, not only from a technical perspective, but also from a cross border transacting perspective.   In the cyber world, a transaction requires a few things including authentication and authorisation.  Just in the real world, but in the cyber world it is more important, as you can now do transactions with somebody that you do not know, and therefore cannot trust the other side.  This is where interoperability comes in.  In order to transact globally as a standard on global cryptocurrencies, a data operability layer or data standard needs to be developed and accepted globally.  This is where the problem will come in, as the moment you bring humans into the equation, there are a few things, that make it difficult to work together.  Each country has its own, traditions, policies and procedures.  It will be very difficult to have a global policy relating to policies and data standards.  It has however been done before, so let's see how that turns out.

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## Smart Contracts
For governments, smart contract technologies will be massive.  Taxes can be collected using smart contracts, which will make it much more difficult to launder money and do fraudulent tax activities.  For the first time, we can have a transparent and honest government :) as everything on a private government blockchain should be transparent and open to the citizens of a country. Accountability can be built into government business processes using smart contracts that will also limit fraudulent activities from a government perspective.

http://www.pwc.com/us/en/technology-forecast/2016/blockchain/sca-process-performance-smart-contracts-simple-to-complex.png
[Image Credit](http://www.pwc.com/us/en/technology-forecast/2016/blockchain/sca-process-performance-smart-contracts-simple-to-complex.png)

# Happy Steeming

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