Development and Implementation of Blockchain Solution to Enable Data Security at University of Port Harcourt

Abstract

Institutions globally, seek for a solution that intelligently manages the security of data without tampering or mutilations. To compete globally, It has become necessary for the educational sector in Nigeria to build a software solution to end the challenges of fake results, transcripts and certificates and the time it takes to verify their authenticity. This research aims to develop and implement a blockchain solution that would enforce the required security for the Centre for Information and Telecommunication Engineering, University of Port Harcourt (CITE, Uniport), Nigeria. In this study the various services that comprise the building of a decentralized blockchain network, the network consensus algorithm and block explorer application as a unit was put together using JavaScript and its associate libraries. The blockchain data structure was developed with the ability of proof of work, the mining of new blocks, the creation of transactions, the validation of the chain, retrieving the data and other functionalities when demanded. The decentralized blockchain network was developed and tested for ten API (application programming interface) servers and the result shows that the blocks and transactions created were broadcasted throughout the entire network. The results of the consensus algorithms proved that it was able to verify and ensure that the network nodes have valid data and are synchronized. The blockchain explorer application was implemented with a lot of features. It allow user to query the blockchain for specific blocks, results, transcript or certificate.