Blockchain technology emerged across the globe in the year 2008 and got popular in 2009. Its initial accomplishment was termed as cryptocurrency Bitcoin. Now, this technology has become immensely popular as most of the IT companies relying on the web and mobile app developers in India and various other nations for revenue generation have also incorporated providing blockchain solutions in their services offered.

Blockchain software consists of a decentralized database that works as a dispersed digital ledger. This technology has provided several benefits in various industries but its decentralized essence has some demerits. This article covers the merits and demerits of blockchain technology.

Merits:

1. Process reliability

Blockchain programs are developed in such a manner that any block or transaction that appends to the chain is not editable by any data hacker thereby providing a great level of security.

2. Traceability

The blockchain design format is in a way that it can straightforwardly trace any trouble and fix it. It also builds a permanent audit trail.

3. Stability

Since the established blocks are improbable to be upturned, it implies that once data is assigned to the blockchain software, it is impossible to alter it. This clearly proves the worth of blockchain for accumulating financial records and similar data where audit trial procedure is needed as every alteration is tracked and everlastingly registered on a dispersed public ledger.

For instance, enterprises can utilize this concept to prohibit deceptive actions by their workforce. In such a situation, blockchain offers a stable and safe record of every financial transaction of a company.

4. Quicker processing

Prior to the introduction of blockchain technology, the conventional banking system used to spend much more time in processing and triggering the transaction but later than the worth of this technology enhanced the pace of transactions to a very high level. The banking procedures taking normally 3 days to complete are now being accomplished within a few minutes or just seconds.

5. More effectiveness and rapidity

The usage of conventional paperwork is a tedious process as e-commerce is a time-consuming procedure that is easily vulnerable to human errors and frequently needs third-party intervention. By reforming and robotizing these processes with blockchain, transactions can be finished quicker and more proficiently. As record-keeping is accomplished using a sole digital ledger that is common amongst members, you need not merge numerous ledgers and you finish up with lesser clutter. When everybody can access the identical information, it becomes simpler to faith each other without the need for several mediators.

Demerits:

1. Inefficient power usage

Power consumption with blockchain is relatively high e.g. bitcoin sole consumed the per capita power of around 159 peculiar nations in a specific year. The maintenance of a real-time ledger is one of the foremost causes for this consumption since each time it builds an innovative node, it connects with all other nodes simultaneously.

2. Requires large storage space

Blockchain ledgers are continuously growing very big with time e.g. bitcoin blockchain needs approximately 200 GB of storage space. The present expansion in blockchain size seems to overtake the rise in hard disks and there is a risk of losing nodes in the network if the ledger grows too big for people to download and store.

3. Private keys

Blockchain utilizes asymmetric or public-key cryptography to impart user’s possession of their cryptocurrency units or some extra blockchain data. Every blockchain address corresponds to a private key. This private key must be kept undisclosed by the users while the address is sharable.

Users require their personal key to access their funds i.e. they operate as their self bank. If some user fails to keep his/her private key undisclosed, then a financial loss is inevitable.

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