Underscoring archival authenticity with blockchain technology

Abstract

Archives have well-established practices which have been developed over years of working with analogue records. Now they face huge challenges due to the inexorable development of digital technologies. Not only is the heterogeneous nature of the records, their instability and the rapid pace of technological development a threat to the records' survival, but the ease with which digital records can be altered has put archives in a technology arms race with those parties who would seek to falsify our digital inheritance and undermine democracy. In order to tackle these challenges, the ARCHANGEL project is breaking new ground by using blockchain to record checksums (cryptographic hashes) and other metadata derived from either scanned physical records or born-digital records to allow verification of their integrity over decade- or century-long time spans. This data is permanently preserved through peer-to-peer distribution and consensus checking without the need for a trusted third party, thereby enabling archives to prove the authenticity of the records in their custody.