Taipei, the capital city of Taiwan is partnering up with the IOTA foundation, seeking to become a smart city by using IOTA’s Tangle protocol for the Internet of Things (IoT).

Tangle will be used to provide several new technology features for the residents of Taipei, including a new process for identification.

Commissioner of the Department of Information Technology in Taipei City Government, Wei-bin Lee, hinted in an official press release that the ‘unique technology’ provided by IOTA will bring in a ‘new era of smart cities for the citizens of Taipei’.

The first project involves the creation of citizen ID cards that are built on the Tangle protocol. The ’TangleID’ cards as they are called, will be designed to eliminated the risks of having your identity stolen or someone else voting in your name. The cards also provide a simple way through which residents can track their health history and other data for government –related services.

Lee provided details on the matter in an email to Coindesk:

“We’ll be starting with related applications for Digital Citizen Card that can be used as a platform. We also seek to boost the authentication and integrity checks for municipality-to-municipality/institution-to-institution data exchange (such as medical records).”

The IOTA company is already in the process of developing a side project for the city which is a palm-sized card with sensors that would detect temperature, pollution, humidity and light. This card is intended to offer the citizens of Taipei real-time information about the pollution levels of their current area.

David Sønstebø, co-f founder of the IOTA Foundation views the implementation of this technology as an incredible progress, noting that ‘the technology is ready for real-world use cases and is more than just a theory’.

The city is also open to working with other technologies or accept othe proposals that might contribute to Taipei’s further development.

While the city is adopting IOTA’s blockchain technology, the city is not yet using any type of digital currency, said Lee.

Details on future projects have not yet been disclosed, but IOTA has been invited to set up an office in Taipei to facilitate new possible projects.

For the time being, the Department of Information Technology, BiiLabs and the foundation will keep discussing project proposals to establish proof of concept.

“After the PoCs, we will evaluate the results and see where we go from there,” concluded Lee.

The many applications of blockchain are now also appealing to the cities of the world, with Dubai and now Taipei adopting such technology, getting them closer to their goal of becoming ’smart cities’.