[Seminer] Blockchain Technology: Beyond Bitcoin

Abstract
"Is it possible to design an electronic payment system based on cryptographic proof instead of trust, allowing any two willing parties to transact directly with each other without the need for a trusted third party?"  This was an open question until 2008, when Satoshi Nakamoto published the paper on Bitcoin, the first realization of blockchain technology.

A blockchain is essentially a distributed database of records, or public ledger of all transactions or digital events that have been executed and shared among participating parties. Each transaction in  the public ledger is verified by consensus of a majority of the   participants in the system. Once entered, information can never be erased. The digital currency Bitcoin itself is highly controversial  but the underlying blockchain technology found wide range of  applications in both financial and non-financial world as more than   half of the world’s largest companies are now researching blockchain technologies with the goal of integrating them into their products. Projects on the management of health care records, property titles, supply chains, and even our online identities are already under the way.

But where does a blockchain make sense, since there is a tradeoff between decentralization and throughput. In this talk, we are going to answer this question, discuss the blockchain technology and also analyze some use-cases in both financial and non-financial sector.

Speaker Info
Neyire Deniz Sarıer studied Classical Piano in Istanbul University State Conservatory (1988-1999) and received double-major BSc. degrees in  Mathematics and Industrial Engineering from ITU in 2005.  With TEV-DAAD scholarship, she obtained her MSc Degree in Media Informatics from RWTH Aachen in 2007 and completed her PhD studies in Computer Science from Bonn University, Germany in 2013 with B-IT Research School doctoral scholarship. She worked as an Assistant Professor in Computer Engineering Department of MEF University during 2014-2016 and as an External Researcher in cosec, B-IT during 2016-2018 conducting research in Biometric Security. Starting from October 2018, she works as a Senior Researcher in Blockchain Research Lab of TUBITAK BILGEM. Her research interests broadly include Blockchain and Cryptocurrencies, biometric security, public-key cryptography and integration of biometrics into cryptographic and blockchain applications for Identity Management.