THEKEY have recently reached an agreement with the Information Center of Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security (MHRSS), and China’s Social Insurance Association (CSIA) to co-operate on research in the area of social insurance blockchain applications.

Social insurance data in China is strictly regulated under the “Social Insurance Law”, which does not allow data to be downloaded or seen by any unauthorised parties. This can make it a difficult process for patients to verify their identity for medical insurance payouts, forcing some people come back to a hospital multiple times with various documents, or pay out-of-pocket.

THEKEY is building a solution called Blockchain-Based Dynamic Multi-Dimentional Identification (BDMI) that uses Personally Identifiable Information (PII) that has been exclusively authorised by government authorities. THEKEY already has access to the data of 210 million citizens through deployment of their first generation Identity Verification tools, and have recently released an award winning MVP of its blockchain based solution.

China’s MHRSS is the worlds largest insurance provider, servicing over 1.4 billion people. The application of blockchain technology in this field will allow citizens to verify their identity and quickly settle claims through the use of smart contracts. This will bring down the operational costs of payments, transactions, clearance and settlement, and as all transactions are recorded to the blockchain, the risk of fraud is reduced. Furthermore, by nature of deploying open source code, trust issues with the Chinese insurance industry can be improved as greater transparency is provided.

The potential to improve upon the social insurance process through the acceleration of blockchain based solutions could have a large impact on the Chinese healthcare industry.

As a result of this agreement, and with the full support of the leadership of the above national Ministries and agencies, THEKEY has launched a USD $20 million scientific research fund（https://www.thekey.vip/#/Fund）focusing on understanding, innovation, and promotion of blockchain-based social insurance applications. A press conference announcing this fund was held in Beijing, China on 30th of June, 2018.

Areas of research will include security, data processing within China’s strict data protection laws, operation and maintenance of medical resources Group Purchasing Organizations (GPO), and the future of processing, analyzing and mining healthcare-centric big data to the benefit of all.

As the initial sponsor of the research fund, THEKEY will supply technical support through it’s own technical team, as well as access to the government support where appropriate.

THEKEY are looking for “highly accomplished academic, commercial, government or NGO individual or institution with outstanding achievements in relevant fields that have intensive international working background and are willing to follow all data security regulations and rules set by Chinese government” to apply for the fund.

Applications can be made at https://www.thekey.vip/#/Fund

More information on THEKEY can be found at the links below.