Microsoft launches the first decentralized infrastructure, which is built directly on the bitcoin blockchain .
An open source project called Ion is based on the mechanics of how networks interact with each other. For example, if you log into Airbnb through Facebook, the software protocol sends personal information from your social profile to an external service provider.
In this case, Ion handles decentralized identifiers that allow you to prove that you own the keys to this data.
Co-founder of the World Wide Web Consortium Working Group (W3C) on decentralized identification (DID) solutions, Christopher Allen believes that Microsoft’s actions could affect the entire technology industry.
"Many corporate infrastructures use Microsoft products, " said Allen.
Therefore, if they integrate it into any of their infrastructure products, they will have access to the DID. ”
Indeed, the blockchain’s Microsoft team manager York Rhodes stated that during the year they had been working on software for signing and verifying keys based on publicly available networks, for example, Bitcoin or Ethereum . At the same time, the solution will have much more bandwidth than the base blockchain.
Highlighting the fact that Microsoft was one of the founders of the Decentralized Identification Fund, Rhodes said:
“In Microsoft, there are systems that provide you with tolerances in a corporate context; a product called Active Directory, in our opinion, should be able to recognize these DIDs as well. ”
He also added that Azure infrastructure products and services are among the most popular Microsoft offerings. This small part in a giant car can open up new powerful perspectives.
Meanwhile, an anonymous source at Microsoft told CoinDesk that this year Ion will switch from using the bitcoin test network to the main one. Thus, any technically savvy user can run a node and contribute to this project.
The difference between the internal DID and the existing infrastructure refers to users owning their own content and access. For example, Facebook may close your social network account, but will not be able to revoke access to all tools that used your Facebook ID to log in. In addition, all personal photos on Facebook will belong to the user-owner of the DID.
In this sense, Facebook may not be consistent with Microsoft’s approach. An anonymous source told CoinDesk that, although Facebook was invited to participate in Microsoft DID projects, the social networking giant refused, preferring to follow the established approach to using user data.
In addition, unlike Facebook, Microsoft prefers open source initiatives, since in the future, a “consumer orientation strategy” is the main principle of Microsoft software development.
“You may have a cloud service with the support of Microsoft Azure, but it is absolutely secure, because everything in it is encrypted using your keys that you control. Thus, you have everything under control, even if the decision is cloudy, ”Allen added.
According to experts, experiments with blockchain technology are comparable to the release of Microsoft in the past decades of Windows 95, which has helped to increase the use of the Internet through a consumer-oriented operating system.
Publication date 14.05.2019
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