GEC NEWS WIREBlockchain, together with artificial intelligence, machine learning, robotics, and virtual and augmented reality, have the potential to deliver disruptive outcomes and reshape digital business in 2018. And companies that have not started the digital investment cycle are at high risk of being disrupted.
This is according to the list of top IT predictions for 2018 published by Dimension Data. But the top trend for the coming year is the adoption of Blockchain – the technology behind Bitcoin – and its immense potential to disrupt and transform the world of money, business, and society using a variety of applications.
Ettienne Reinecke, Dimension Data’s Group Chief Technology Officer, says Blockchain has gone from strength to strength. “It’s ironic that the cybercriminals who perpetrated the recent WannaCry ransomware attack could hold a federal government to ransom and demand to be paid in Bitcoin. Bitcoin might be a crypto-currency, but it’s based on Blockchain, and if cybercriminals are confident that Bitcoin provides a safe mechanism for the payment of ransoms, it indicates just how secure the distributed ledger approach is. I believe that Blockchain has the potential to totally re-engineer cybersecurity, but the industry has yet to come to terms with it.”
Mechelle Buys Du Plessis, Managing Director, Dimension Data Middle East concurs with Reinecke and says, “We have seen a leading uptake of Blockchain with Smart Dubai, as it sets out on a journey of adopting Blockchain to provide simpler and secure services across multiple government agencies to better serve citizens, residence and tourists. With ambitious growth figures forecasted for tourism, Smart Dubai is gearing up to provide seamless services to allow for simple, secure transactions. We are already seeing progress towards paperless processes, which will lead up to the utilization of blockchain. Furthermore, we have also seen the finance sector taking to blockchain and digitization initiatives. There is no denying that blockchain will become more prevalent in the region in 2018.”
