Rachel Wolfson on blockchain initiatives during COVID-19

0:20appreciate it hey you're very welcome I'd love to kick off the show by getting a little bit of your background on yourself your work in reporting and how that led to writing for one of the top cryptocurrency news sites today coin Telegraph yeah definitely so a little bit of background on myself I've been writing about blockchain and cryptocurrency well about space since

0:422017 I started off writing for Huffington Post as a contributor and I think I published my first blockchain article I think it was July 2017 and then from there I became a staff writer with Bitcoin magazine in December 2017 and then I eventually got on as a Forbes contributor in 2018 spent almost two years with Forbes and then in 2019 at the end of 2019 I got on

1:13as a staff reporter with Clementine Telegraph so very excited about that I really like that writing for point Telegraph so far so yeah that's kind of my background in the space that's great and I could imagine you're jumping into a you know crazy pit of news in the cryptocurrency industry there's so many things going on all the time and to jump in you know with Bitcoin Magazine right

1:36when Bitcoin was at its all-time high price I could imagine the sentiment and the news articles were firing out every day has it been very fast-paced since you jumped in yeah I mean you know you bring up a good point in 2017 when I started with Bitcoin magazine I mean things were a lot different in terms of like the cryptocurrency space like the hype was really high

1:59I SEOs were the thing back then and so you know at that time I was constantly being pitched i SEOs which thankfully I didn't write about too many of them because a lot of them you know just ended up being scams but then in 2018 we started seeing enterprises starting to leverage blockchain technology and so that was great and I think that really matched with the whole like you

2:21know being a contributing writer with Forbes to write about it the enterprise is using blockchain rather than like you know the cryptocurrency side of things in 2017 it was all very kind of sketchy back then so I mean yeah it's been fast-paced but it's been different throughout many years for sure right now 2020 I mean there's less hype around blockchain and cryptocurrency but to me

2:46I'm still getting so many press releases and for me it's still very fascinating space I mean I think now we're seeing real world innovation with blockchain versus what we were seeing in 2017 which was more about like you know the ICO is in crypto currency side of things there was definitely a lot more just ideas on paper back then and now we're starting

3:09to weed out and see where's the real value this you know it can be properly implemented in two different enterprise businesses and there's been some good news and there's been a lot of news since the lockdown started especially and I noticed that you had recently reported on a blockchain company looking to look for the legitimacy of K n95 masks because of counterfeiting and

3:34that's one part of the supply chain that blockchain can help with you know when you dug into this story was there a lot of you know is it something that is really needed right now in terms of this is a major counterfeiting issue and how exactly did you see blockchain solving that problem yeah I mean one of the best use cases for blockchain is that it

3:57provides transparency and it can really be used to provide transparency when it comes to supply chain management not only does it provide transparency but also connects different entities together where they can all kind of communicate on one single platform so blockchain for supply chain management is really useful that being said a real X company they're the public lock chain

4:25by transparent see during this global pin though basically when I in the article k n95 masks are different than in 95 masks I don't know if you knew that but not a lot of people know that so anyways k n95 masks are manufactured in China and they're not I guess they

4:54aren't really used in America because they are the n95 masks are proved by the FDA I don't think the K + 95 masks are so what real items company is doing by leveraging the B chain block chain they're ensuring that these K and 95 masks being produced at a factory with a location in China and in Seattle that these are authentic K and ninety-five masks keep in mind that China does

5:19account for 80% of the world's counterfeit products so a lot of the products coming from China are counterfeits so a lot of these K and 95 masks that people are getting that aren't authenticated are counterfeit masks meaning they really don't provide much use if you're gonna go to the grocery store and wear a mask you want it to be you know a legitimate useful

5:41mask that will help keep you safe if you if you're wearing a fake K + 95 mask I mean that's no better than covering your face with like a handkerchief definitely an important issue and I believe you know the KN 95 asked are supposed to be very similar to n 95 but I could imagine if you had a counterfeit one it would not be very similar at all so and that's

6:04great to see that V chain as you know one of the larger blockchain platforms is helping verify the authenticity through their platform I'm curious on the business side of it is it very easy to for a customer to check the authenticity of a mask or for the suppliers or is it all you know in the back end with coders and it's not very you know user-friendly to actually see

6:28the verification on the blockchain yes I mean according to David the CEO of real items company and they're the ones doing this and leverage seviche blockchain there's a barcode on each box so there are boxes with the masks inside of them each box contains a barcode when you scan that barcode with a smartphone you can see that these maps were produced in a

6:56certain factory and that they are authentic K and 95 masks so I mean it's as easy as that just scanning a barcode with your smartphone to see for the retailer's to see that they've been shipped a legitimate supply of K and 95 masks and then as far as the consumer goes I actually I'm not sure if they can also scan the barcode to see I think that they can I could be wrong but I know for

7:21sure that the retailers and scan that barcode to see that these masks were produced in that certain factory that real items company is partnering with and that all of those masks have been authenticated and everything is transparent because it's on the beach day and blockchain so you can see all the information that's needed to know that these masks are authentic

7:44well it's great to know that it's as easy as a barcode to scan but I guess the question that lies beyond that is for you know real items company to implement this you know these mask manufacturers have had to ramp up their production so quickly you know with the pandemic coming out of nowhere not like they've been in discussion on implementing blockchain for a long time

8:07was it easy or is it easy for blockchain companies to integrate into supply chain and this quickly to start verifying masks when people who are creating counterfeit masks can just as easily start their production up and start shooting out fake masks at the same speed right I mean and that's a really good question I think I spoke with David about the challenges of implementing

8:32blockchain and these companies to be used to authenticate K and ninety-five masks and basically you know I think the challenge here is that blockchain is still a developing emerging technology and companies are still hesitant to bring blockchain on to their platform and to leverage it because they don't know much about it and also when you think of blockchain sometimes I mean I

8:57don't anymore but maybe in 2017 you thought of block chaining you would think of Bitcoin or cryptocurrency I mean in this case has nothing to do with crypto or Bitcoin it's just leveraging the technology to provide transparency and authenticate these products I think the challenge is getting companies to agree to use blockchain and also I think regulations are also challenging I don't

9:19know in terms of like you know the regulations around K + 95 masks in America and what steps need to be taken in order to even have these used here but I think I think just really getting these companies on board to use blockchain is one of the main challenges I mean you also have to realize that like companies have to share their data with different entities and some

9:40companies don't want to do I mean in the case of authenticating K + 95 masks I think that isn't as problematic as you know for instance sharing for like the IBM through trust network where they're different food suppliers sharing data like Walmart might not want Carrefour to know you know their to have their or access data they're both on the same

10:03network but I think in this case of the in 1995 masks it's different yeah and I love that you touched on the fact that it's not really paying with cryptocurrency or you know using Bitcoin or Manero or any of these cryptographic coins it's really still paying with fiat just using the blockchain as a tool to verify the authenticity and often people that are just starting to learn about

10:26blockchain have not differentiated the – between a cryptocurrency and a blockchain that can you know imprint information so I'm really glad that you've clarified that now one of the other hot topics since the lockdown has been voting across America you know people are locked in their houses they don't want to go into mass lineups or go vote yeah it's at the you know at the

10:50ballot station so they're looking at mail-in voting potentially internet voting and this is where blockchain also comes into play with blockchain based voting so they can prove you know the authenticity of one vote one person you recently did some findings into this could you elaborate a little bit on the situation and where you see blockchain fitting into this

11:10right now yeah definitely so yeah I did write an article about that recently and I'm I wrote about votes so there a blockchain based voting platform and I mean the conclusion that I came to in the article is that blockchain still has the same security vulnerabilities as online voting platforms do I mean it's not it's not more secure than you know the

11:37typical ways that you can vote on a smartphone for instance what glock kane adds though is that it adds transparency so in accountability as well so when you're using an online voting platform to send votes you know yes that's that's vulnerable to security issues like malware attacks and all that but sometimes you don't know if your vote was accounted for or like you know and

12:04you want to know that and so blockchain can provide that information that extra layer of accountability and transparency to this whole you know to the online voting situation so I wouldn't say that it's it's more secure it's not for sure but it just adds an extra layer of transparency and accountability if that's something that's necessary in this case which I think it is I mean

12:27imagine submitting a vote and not you know not knowing if your vote was even counted or what so yeah definitely very important to be able to check that your vote actually mattered and you can mail out a vote and never hear a word back and be unsure so but it's really interesting that you touch on that it's not more secure right now now do you know if that's because of the way that

12:49it's being implemented and you know from a bird's-eye view of blockchain a lot of people see it as you know in confiscate able money or it's it's very more secure than a private database is it a way that voting can be implemented in the future which will allow for the security features of blockchain as well do you know if it the times will change with

13:10that yeah I mean and I and I wrote about this in the article as well as of now like for instance votes it's a great platform and I know West Virginia was using it at some point and apparently that pilot went really really well but there are some issues that need to be worked out to make it that ideal platform so while Lok Shan is a great use case for voting it still has some

13:38vulnerabilities that need to be worked out in order to ensure that this is a more secure way of voting I quoted Ben fish he is a PhD he's studying PhD at Stanford he's getting his PhD in cryptography at Stanford excuse me and he wrote that there are ways to work around to ensure that lock chain would provide a more secure voting system but

14:05those ways haven't been achieved yet so he discusses great so I guess we're not gonna be voting on the Bitcoin blockchain for this upcoming election right and I mean even votes and they're pretty well established they've been around for a while I mean they've still got some issues to work out but it's totally possible to work those issues out to ensure that this platform becomes

14:27widely adopted and used in the future in West Virginia even the contact that I spoke to there mentioned that he would like to eventually implement votes again moving forward once those you know issues are worked out so we'll just see what happens that's great and lastly I saw that you're participating in the virtual blockchain week there's been a crazy

14:51amount of virtual events coming up with nobody allowed to go outside and they're no fiending for some connection what are you going to be speaking about in the virtual blockchain week and when is it for it for the viewers yeah so I'm going to give a 20-minute keynote presentation during virtual blockchain week I believe I'm doing that on April

15:1227th maybe 6 p.m. PST I'm not sure of the exact time and date but I can get back to you on that but I'm going to be speaking about the blockchain industry from a journalist's perspective meaning you know I think I'm gonna talk about a blockchain through the years for instance just kind of what we were talking about in the beginning of the interview you know what have I seen

15:39what's changed what do I think the future of blockchain looks like mm-hm and then I know everybody is curious well not everybody but people and the space are curious like how do you pitch a journalist and you know what do I need to know when speaking with the journalists how do I get my story published like what's interesting so I'm gonna go into a little bit of those

15:59details as well so yeah I'm excited that's great and if there are people that are looking to follow your work or get in contact with you what is the best way for them to reach out and find more yeah definitely so I'm very active on twitter my handle is at Rachel Wulff zero zero if you message me there follow me I'll definitely respond you can also connect with me on LinkedIn I use

16:26Instagram I my name there's blockchain in bikinis so yeah I can I'll respond there as well and also email is good my coin Telegraph email is Rachel at coin Telegraph calm great thank you so much Rachel I will leave all of that in the description box below for the viewers and it's been a pleasure speaking with you and all the best moving forward with

16:49your work and with your keynote at the virtual blockchain week and let's follow up in the near future yeah sounds good thank you Ashton