It was bound to happen before long: backup company Acronis has decided the blockchain has a role in your data protection regime.

As the company points out, “Blockchain secured data has provable integrity because the data is attributed to an irrefutable identity, is validated by all copies of the ledger, is always available, and can never be changed.”

Those qualities, the company points out, are rather handy when one wishes to prove the provenance of data. Or if one is using multi-tenanted storage and wishes to make sure that your data is your data and not someone else's Q1_2016.xls.

Acronis says it is “extending its data storage solutions and file sync and share solutions with Blockchain technology to monitor data integrity and guarantee validity at all times.” It is also kite-flying a bit , as while it has cooked up a demo that reg-walled effort appears largely cosmetic.

Of more note is the company's admission that it is “seeking input from individuals and organizations on potential data protection use cases for blockchain technology.”

As well it might: this seems like a good idea with some obvious applications, but also well and truly worthy of more discussion, notwithstanding the fact that storage companies already have chain of custody offerings. ®