Crypto network promises hack-proof history of Russia's Ukraine invasion
business-standard.comCrypto technology could play a unique role in how Russia’s intensifying invasion of Ukraine gets recorded into history.
Videos of Russian troops occupying Chernobyl and explosions rocking Kyiv make up some of the millions of digital records documenting the conflict being held on Arweave, a decentralized data storage network.
It’s the decentralization that’s key to why Arweave says its archive will prove so vital. Because there are lots of copies of the data stored in lots of places, it essentially can’t be hacked or erased -- even if one copy goes down, there are plenty of back-ups. Plus, the data can’t be edited once it’s put onto the network.
“We started this project to build a censorship-resistant ledger of history,” said Sam Williams, Arweave co-founder and chief executive officer.
Cyber warfare has already played a role in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Kyiv Post, an English-language news site in Ukraine, has been targeted by digital attacks. The site has had articles uploaded to Arweave for preservation, Williams said. Meanwhile, Russia has partially limited access to Facebook and slowed access to Twitter on mobile devices over disagreements on content.
Already, Arweave holds more than 6.6 million tweets, videos, photos and articles related to the Ukraine conflict, according to ViewBlock, a data tracker that logs Arweave transactions. Anyone with a crypto wallet, and who’s willing to pay a fee of about 1 cent per megabyte, is able to add to the archive. The trove of data can be accessed publicly through the ViewBlock website.
The swift and massive influx of data shows the power of being able to add to the archive of history in real time. While social media can widely disseminate information, sifting through and
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