The International Telecommunication Union has decided the time has come to consider whether Blockchain deserves its attention so it can be considered for future security standards.
Study Group 17 of the Union's Standardization Sector (ITU-T), which is dedicated to security, has scheduled a workshop in March to “examine blockchain’s potential to build trust into a wider variety of our interactions online”.
The meeting has been slotted in before a week-long gabfest that will consider SG 17's many efforts to create security standards for things like secure operations of voice-over-LTE networks, or lifecycle management of e-commerce business data. So there's every chance the meeting will attract a decent crowd of serious security wonks.
Among the aims of the blockchain meeting are :
Provide a platform to share findings and for dialogue on policy and regulatory implications of blockchain between enterprises working on blockchain applications and regulators from various industrial-/economic sectors; Identify potential items that SG17 needs to analyze or review in the future, and Identify stakeholders with whom SG17 could collaborate further on and potential collective action and specific next steps to advance.That's a long way from the ITU baking blockchain into a standard. But merely organising the meeting it is also surely a sign that the organisation takes blockchain seriously and is open to the possibility it could be useful. And that's a decent step forward.