Let’s push new boundaries together!

Greetings, folks!

At Geens, we’re building an end-to-end encrypted cloud storage and timestamping services based on the Ethereum Blockchain. While many projects are making future promises to build great DApps, we already have a working Proof of Concept (POC). Give it a try: Geens.

A recent tweet from Kim Dotcom, an active Internet freedom fighter, suggests that it’s high time to return the privacy to the people:

Privacy and security are and always will be our top priority. That’s why we are aiming to share our knowledge with the wider community so that more people will understand the importance of our platform and the possibilities of the Blockchain technology. This article is not focused to explain the terms, like Blockchain, Ethereum, Smart Contracts and Cryptography, so if you are unfamiliar with these words, please use your favourite search engine to find out what it means. There are a plethora amount of good articles explaining the basic principles behind these technologies, so we do not want to exclude a specific one.

In this article, we would like to introduce you to our timestamping service.

Timestamping

Contents

1. What is a timestamping?

2. How does it work?

3. How to use it?

4. Common use cases

5. Bounties!

6. Contribute to the ICO

What is a timestamping?

Basically, it is a service that allows to hash any file (text, photo, video, sound, etc) and store the generated hash on the Blockchain. Generally, it could use any Blockchain, but our service particularly uses the Ethereum Blockchain. Data stored on the Blockchain is immutable and incorruptible. Every file stored in Geens could be timestamped on the Blockchain. By using this technology, you can prove the file’s authenticity and integrity without exposing its contents. Contrary to a traditional notary service, here you don’t need a trustworthy third party. You can do it yourself, right now!

After timestamping your file, you receive a certificate that contains the essential information such as timestamp date and time, a file’s hash which represents file’s integrity, and an address of transaction by which the file hash was added into the Blockchain.

Timestamp certificate

We know that this feature is not unique but we are not aiming to reinvent the wheel, our goal is to combine the best practices into one fully-fledged solution.

How does it work?

As mentioned above, the Geens users can timestamp their files on the Blockchain without revealing the actual content.

A unique digital fingerprint (commonly referred to as a “hash”) is calculated from a file. This fingerprint is a 64 characters string that represents your document. It is submitted to the Blockchain (via Smart Contract) and when the transaction is approved, your document’s existence is permanently validated. This timestamp proves that a particular set of information existed prior to a specific point in time. The documents itself is not stored on the Blockchain. We never see or store your data.

Technical details (safe to skip)

If you are curious how it works under the hood, here is a simple explanation. An SHA-256 hash is generated from a file. It unambiguously describes the whole content of the file. If you change your document just a little bit, you will get a completely different set of characters. Also, the process is irreversible, that is to say, there is no possibility to retrieve the file’s contents from a given hash. When the hash is generated, it is passed as an argument to our Timestamping smart contract. Smart contract saves it on its storage and because smart contract lives on the Blockchain, it means that your timestamp was also saved there… Permanently.

How to use it?

At the day of writing this article, over 1000 people have already used our timestamping service. It’s as easy as ABC. Seriously, it only takes a few clicks. Login to your Geens account. Select a file that you want to timestamp. Click the timestamping button. Then click the “Submit” button. Voilà!

You can see the whole process here:

Common use cases

Timestamping has a wide adoption in our lives. Among other applications, document timestamping is used to protect copyright, unique ideas or patents, to prove that the document was signed prior to a specific date (Proof of Existence), to acknowledge ownership (Proof of Ownership) and so on. Keep in mind, that Blockchain timestamps can be used as a legal evidence in courts across the globe.

To let you understand it even better, our team has prepared an infographic image displaying the most common use cases: