AI and Blockchain: A Groundbreaking Integration
— By Jad El Kattar
Blockchain and AI are at the heart of the main tech innovation we are currently living. By introducing radical changes in our day-to-day lives, both technologies are set to fundamentally reset the way we live, interact and work. Being at the top of the disruptive technologies, they are expected to contribute to the global economy with trillions of dollars.
The integration of these two emerging technologies could clear the path for a future, not very far from sci-fi, autonomous cars, and virtual agents. This integration could also automate and replace the critical need for third parties in multiple fields and industries. Users will no longer have to trust unreliable middlemen. The combination of smart contracts, artificial intelligence, and cryptography will provide a far more secure way to exchange goods and services.
Let’s dive deep into the integration between these two giant technologies.
The AI Prospect
According to the fathers of AI, John McCarthy, and Marvin Minsky, any task performed by a machine or a program seems to require intelligence. Systems associated with AI are often found to show behaviors connected with human intelligence such as learning, problem-solving, planning, and reasoning.
The latest rally in AI technology is mainly powered by machine learning and deep learning, which made the actual training of machine learning models and algorithms much easier. Other technologies, with their development, have also contributed to the creation of a specific environment for AI.
However, even with all these exciting developments, we are seeing, such as self-driving cars and delivery robots, the evolvement of AI tech causes some concerns. Concerns such as the creation of fake news and fake — but realistic — photos and voices, invade people’s privacy. The high costs of computing resources, as well as the high barriers to acquiring data and talent, may result in the monopolization of AI power among the major players.
Blockchain Technology: Popularity & Hype
In basic terms, the blockchain is a public ledger shared by all the users in a distributed network. With its advanced features such as immutability, the Blockchain offers a highly secure. In other words, the prime feature of immutability makes the information and data on-chain impossible to modify without the consensus of the whole network.
With that being said, comes the PoW (Proof of Work) and PoS (Proof of Stake) protocols that we will explain in a later blog.
The current fake hype about cryptocurrencies and NFTs is found to distract everyone from the real potential of Blockchain Technology. Putting all this hype aside, we can see that Blockchain Technology is the main pioneer moving forward towards a decentralized future with a server-less network, where each user can control their data.
This technology is expected to revolutionize all industries we are currently living in, starting with the monetary system on one hand and the healthcare system on another hand, with an improved method of tracking and securing data.
What are the possibilities of integrating AI and Blockchain?
In simpler words, blockchain technology is still short on scalability, security, and efficiency. AI tech has its concerns when it comes to explainability, privacy, and trustworthiness. The integration between these two technologies would be so disruptive, that the outcome will revolutionize the upcoming digital generation — web3.0 (Or perhaps web4.0?)
AI can for example contribute to the development of a machine learning system on top of the blockchain bringing better scalability, security, and better governance and personalization. Blockchain technology could on the other hand contribute to the privacy and trustlessness systems of AI. The marriage between these two technologies would be something to look out for.
Artificial Intelligence for Blockchain
By nature, blockchain technology involves a big number of trade-offs between performance, decentralization, and scalability. The integration of AI would optimize and automate the blockchain for better performance. Furthermore, AI could play an important role in providing privacy and confidentiality to blockchain users.
AI for security and scalability
Blockchains are immutable and almost impossible to hack. However, most applications built on top of the blockchains are hackable and at risk of exploits. Machine learning development could lead to a blockchain governed by AI, and this is where the AI itself would help in detecting the probability of an attack and defend against it accordingly.
AI for Privacy
In web2.0, user information is being massively collected by every single application to personalize the content we have access to on the web. Integrating AI and Blockchain can help in providing privacy to users instead of pushing it to the respective companies — just like it is currently being pushed and sold. AI would perform all the needed computations locally and therefore eliminate the need of pushing your data to the big companies that live off your personal information.
AI for Smart Contracts
Smart Contracts are the central programs — stored on the blockchain — that manage transactions on the blockchain. The advancement in machine learning makes the AI model capable of solving complex situations both on-chain and off-chain, in order to provide the user with a smoother experience, and definitely not a casual third-party intervention. Any decision taken would be data-driven, making it more consistent and justified.
Blockchain for Artificial Intelligence
Blockchain technology, if integrated correctly with AI, has the ability to coordinate multiple components of AI which will lead to the adoption of AI to an unprecedented level, of course, while making it explainable and transparent.
Blockchain for user data sharing
With its inherent feature of transparency, Blockchain integration with AI could encourage the user into more data sharing, since the user will be aware of all the details of data such as who accessed the data or at what time using the blockchain explorer tool (Etherscan for example).
Blockchain for AI systems
Even if machine learning has been building successful autonomous systems, users are afraid to adopt them; and this is because a major part of the decisions made by these systems is unexplainable. To ensure mass adoption, it is essential to integrate Blockchain Technology with AI systems, since Blockchain Technology enables the building of an immutable and clear trail that tracks data flow. Making this type of trail available will help the user understand the whole process of the AI systems better.
Blockchain for coordinating between devices
Coordinating devices, such as cell phones, IoT devices, and automated robots into making joint decisions, hold a lot of potential for the future of AI. Applications such as these can range from installing new software on devices all the way to coordinating robots or jets on tactical missions. Integration of Blockchain Technology will definitely improve security, therefore protecting systems from potential hacks.
Conclusion
Despite all of the evolvement we’ve seen to this day in these two technologies, both AI and Blockchain still have a long road ahead of them. However, going into the next few years, this integration would offer unlimited possibilities, that would be definitely realized with more research and development.
