An IoT and blockchain-based approach for ensuring transparency and accountability in regulatory compliance

Abstract

Regulatory compliance is an essential exercise in the modern societies confirming safety and prevention of harm to consumers. Despite many efforts from international and national quality control authorities, transparency and accountability in regulatory compliance remain a challenging technical-legal problem sitting atop a heavy reliance on trust. This paper presents a theoretical model of regulatory compliance aiming at improving accountability for systems and data audit and introduces a higher degree of transparency in management and quality control. It explores the technical aspects of two emerging technologies the Internet of Things (IoT) and Blockchain, and using a common use-case in practice shows how to better align these technologies with legal concerns and trust in regulatory compliance.