Topic: Why not "COVID" vaccine passports on a blockchain ID (Read 474 times)

Regarding about the vaccine, being vaccinated doesn't mean you're COVID-19 free so you're free to travel whenever you want thinking you're safe from the virus. A lot of people here in my country are vaccinated already but somehow still, some of them still gets COVID-19.

But regarding about the Blockchain Identity, I would say it's very convenient and easy to use rather than bringing your passport that could be misplace or stolen by someone which would be hassle for you when you're travelling. It's a good thing if Governments would implement such kind of innovation in the future.

yeah except for some countries want exact vaccine to pass borders. You cant get all vaccines

it has its good and bad, people doesnt want anyone to track them, on the other hand it has possitive sides, finding people, checking health etc..

So is a standard RFID, seriously we don't have to put blockchain in somewhere that isn't necessary when there are other things that could do the same work at more efficient levels and more cheaper. If it ain't broke, don't fix it right?

Valid point! But I have a question, why "covid vaccine passports" at all?! And a concern, how covid vaccine passports are related to the economy? Except for the ones who will be paid for making them...they can earn some money for their "special passport design" that cost a lot, and of course, the money is coming from our own pockets! So there's some money involved, so there must be some economy, right?!

This is probably a service discussion... is it possible to make something like this, and to be accessible for all the people in all parts of the world... pros and cons, problems and solutions... like I said, some service!


Nice! I can't agree more with you here!

Because it will take more time and will incur more money. Plus technological barriers will make it so people will have an excuse not to be vaccinated, so although the paper COVID passport may seem primitive to some of us, It's simplicity and accessibility ensures that everyone can use its features without too much effort incurred on one side. Unlike digitizing the passport, where some of us still has a flip-phone instead of a smartphone in hand.

One drawback is ppl could sell their private key. There does not seem to be any way around it, except to embed something about the person's identity (eg, name) into the message, and have the person show their photo ID to the business. But that is a tradeoff of privacy for security.

I think this is a really good solution. It's low cost, secure, and can be used internationally. I would include the type of vaccine (eg, Sinovac, Pfizer, etc) because it might turn out that some of them do not work. Also one would need to keep each message, for the first vaccine, second vaccine, booster shot, etc, and the business could look at all of this information to determine if a person is 10 days out from the 2nd vaccine (if it is a 2-vaccine series).

Yes, I completely agree with you. It is quite possible to make a unified record of vaccination passports at least at the level of each state with open access based on the blockchain and it would be economically profitable. If the coronavirus does not recede for a long time, then, perhaps, as a result, governments will think of it. In a paper version, it is very expensive, and they will certainly be forged. Ordinary closed databases of such databases can be compromised. Such a blockchain-based framework is the perfect solution.

you dont need a database.
you can instead just have smart contracts

imagine a vaccine centre signs with their keypair a message of
patient ID:
date: 12/3/21
batch: 143

that signature is proof you got vaccinated by that vaccine centre.
each signature is unique but each signature has a validation method.

you can carry around that signature and that signature can verify its contents. with a simple check
you can prove you are that patient by you signing your own message that corresponds to your public key

no database. no blocks no chains needed
airlines dont need access to all patient records. dont even need to validate all records on some database
they just ask for the signature from those wanting to fly

You are almost totally correct except representing privacy for anonymity, they are completely different. The verifiable identity will only make privacy to be reality but it is not anonymous as the distributed ledger (blockchain) is not anonymous but private because only your cryptographic key can be used to access your vaccination validity. Anything anonymous is what anyone do not know about except you, so using it in this regard is not correct, but privacy is correct in this regard.

While I do not trust much economic magazines on crypto knowledge, this leads me to think that it is not such a bad idea. You do not really need a lot of infrastructure even on third world countries. Most do have a degree of connectivity, even by cell, at those points where using a health passport would make sense.

I respect arguments against it, but most of them are simply out of not understanding that there is already encrypted blockchains, encrypted execution on the blockchain, etc... So no, an spreadsheet is not the same.

I think we all underestimate just how early days these are in the terms of Blockchain, I imagine in 5 years we will all look back and think, how did we get by without this.

blockchain technology has indeed become a modern technology and will be very useful to be used as a main ledger without fear of losing any data entered. However for some reason some countries are still not using it. There is still no mass adoption of the real use of blockchain. The application of the Vacsin Passport is a pretty good innovation, but not everyone is familiar with blockchain technology and it certainly looks unfamiliar.

blockchain innovation in medicine has been around for a few years, but its real application has yet to be realized, only a beta project that is not developing.

Not really since computers and IT related device is cheap. It's not a problem, especially at the airport.

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Anyway, identity on the blockchain is not a new thing, and I believe a few companies are working on it (since I often read about it on Twitter, CMIIW).
However, the idea of a "covid vaccine passport" is a whole new different level of absurdity. Why stop at Covid, not Polio, Tetanus, Measles, etc.?

I thought about this, you could retain anonimity whilst also proving youve had the vaccine! obviouslt being Anon doesnt matter at airports but at bars and such this could help

Because it cannot be modified and with the details and information about the covid vaccine passport, there's still a huge debate towards it. It's still not acceptable for them to use such system like blockchain. And it's about the approval of the government.

As you know, they're not too knowledgeable about blockchain and crypto. And if they'll hear a solution for the vaccine passport like blockchain, the first thing that would come to their minds is that it's only about crypto.

I think ShareRing is already working on it.

They have a concept of COVID passports on the blockchain right here: https://www.forbes.com/sites/nisaamoils/2020/08/02/sharering-uses-blockchain-to-solve-self-sovereign-identity-and-proof-of-health-simultaneously/?sh=2b5dc5363e61

I certainly like COVID passports to be integrated by blockchain technology due to it’s transparency, unhackable and tamper-proof technology. Thailand has already started implementing COVID passports, but not sure if they are using their own centralised system or blockchain technology.

I just wish other countries would be doing the same. It would be easy for travelers as long they’re showing the proof that they are completely vaccinated.

Ofcourse (at the bolded). 
In addition to that, a true Decentralized ID has to be privacy/anonymity friendly, ID private information has to be controlled/known by their owners alone, ID verifiers must not be able to store users IDs in anyway, etc

Decentralized ID Scheme has to unique and safer than the centralized ones.

I believe that it is a waste of function of blockchain, vaccine passports doesn't need to be that complex, a simple database and simple anti-tampering stickers is enough to do the job. I know that it looks good that it can be part of blockchain but in the long run, I don't think that it is worth it.

Well, it is very logical, but as you are asking why, there will also be countries that question why use it and its effectiveness is worth it. First of what you're thinking about, I think this phase is all vaccinated, so it will take time to research and integrate it. So I think this has also been a lot of people thinking about it and I think it will be for the future when we have full technology and adoption, the application to any field in life will are all resolved.

Its not that easy to migrate into another system and for sure, blockchain will take time which is unnecessary for a time like this. We know how good blockchain is, but I’m sure government knows also how to create a good system which is already happening in many countries like Japan, New Zealand, Vietnam and many more without even using blockchain technology, so again this is not the top priority as of the moment.

I agree with you. The pandemic and related events require a quick and effective response from the state authorities, and the current situation is not conducive to experiments in this area. Let's be honest, that despite some successful experience of implementing blockchain in different areas of public administration, it is still worth recognizing that all this is an isolated case and it is much more convenient for the authorities to use the usual tools that have shown their efficiency in the pre-pandemic time.

I believe, people are just thinking of ways how to make the process easier and smoother. However, authorities are not yet ready to utilize blockchain technology because most of them have no idea where to start. So if in case it will be implemented, it would take time and resources to deliver this kind of project. And right now, people have no interest on this task as there are more pressing matters to attend to. But of course, once this technology is implemented, the life would be much easier. However, it takes time to accomplish this project.

People are always thinking and linking that things happening in the world can be resolved by means of putting blockchain in between as if it can resolve anything. Remember all things have their own limitations no matter what happen. There could be areas they are very useful and there are things that others can do it on their own. Now with the case of putting info on a blockchain ID whether yoy have got vaccinated or what, it is not already needed for there are documents and medical records since the lifting of the travel ban implemented as a requirement before you can be able to travel and such way is already enough and blockchain will not be already needed to tag along.

Maybe because the government authorities do not have a decent and reliable application from developers?  For standard data management, traditional databases are also quite suitable, especially since government organizations have much more experience in using traditional databases than databases built on blockchain technology By the way, I would not be surprised if some country really tries to use blockchain, but I do not think that this will be a mass phenomenon.

Maybe that's true, but when it comes to data management blockchain could've served better. Even with the present vaccination records management it is good to have combined data, but this isn't shared on cross border travel. I don't know how it works, but one of my friend told me about an application in which it automatically reports if someone is not maintaining social distance as well as about rise in body temperature. If that is possible data management can be made precise eliminating unwanted quarantine. However it is the government to make the decision as said in the post.

This topic could be ended with a phrase about the laws and medical data of citizens.
Each country has its own requirements for medical information on vaccinations, so it makes no sense to use blockchain for these purposes.
I don't think it is the best idea to use blockchain in all infrastructures, including medicine.

It doesn't even need to be a big deal, as far as I remember there were even some small carribean type of nation that actually put all the national ID information on blockchain, since they are island nations even one big fire could destroy all files and yes they can put it on servers but servers could be compromised as well whereas blockchain is something that's all around the world p2p so it will probably not be destroyed ever, could it be hacked? That depends on the software that uses it, but it is at least safe there and can be reached anytime we want.

Same could be used with vaccine passports and it could be on blockchain very easily, it wouldn't take more than 30 days to build something like that and spread it and put all the data in there, just one month. However governments probably didn't want to deal with that since it is a new technology, it is easy but it is new, so they went with the old one.

The companies that encrypt it can easily decrypt it to sell our data for profit, blockchain is the best in my opinion. I do not yet know much about how the blockchain will be, but to my best of knowledge, no personal data will be stored on the blockchain. For example, the cryptographic key will only be like transaction ID (although not transaction ID), which will only reveal if someone is vacinated or not, no other information stored/revealed other than that. No medical officials to store data on any database as it is against the total makeup of the distributed ledger.

1. The ledger will clearly not be decentralized (who would store and mine that and for what incentive?!). That's why it's not better than an ordinary database (it's actually worse).
2. If needed the API that accesses the DB can give you whatever keys and proof they implement, from something basic to cryptographic keys too.
3. I was referring to crooked officials manipulating the data. Either a DB entry is altered or added, either a blockchain entry (unalterable) is added, somebody will get a fake "passport".

All in all, while blockchain is - in theory - not changeable (depends on implementation though, it can be done bad too), as long as somebody can add new records it's not really better than a DB. Also since it's not decentralized, also a hacker can do deeper change (double spend), but indeed, that's more difficult. And since it's cheap to just add a new record, it doesn't make sense to hassle.
So I don't see a real advantage of the (again, centralized) blockchain for this use case.


You know that databases can also be encrypted, right? You know that whoever can access the software creating the blockchain can also read/understand the info, so it's not a difference from the DB, right?

Its can be one of the great utilization of blockchain technology, however it should be implemented throughout the world to work which maybe the issue because we can't expect to have such kind of fast adoption all over the world. They may choose to adopt only if developed countries started to utilize this kind of passports.

Government doesn't know much about blockchain system works that's why you can see that they are still using the old method, and its long research to make this thing happen and this is not the time for doing some test regarding on using it on vaccine passport, maybe on other important things if they really want to explore the wide use of blockchain ecosystem.

Because this will cut the black market and the black market will be very actual in some regions globally (including my own country).

People always want to have access 'to another way' which is blocked by the blockchain, especially for controversies like mass vaccination.

It can be a good idea, but as you said, it's too futuristic, and our governments are lazy as sloth, so why would they really care implementing such product and technology when they can just enjoy the luxury of their beautiful cars and houses?! I do however think that, the blockchain can be better used for other more useful purposes if it's used by government rather than proving someone have had covid, because there are lots of problems with higher priorities that can be solved using blockchain technology.

The world needs something like this while the vaccination is still ongoing, so we have a database of people who got vaccinated, this will not be the last virus or pandemic that we are going to encounter, and by having this we have something in place already, maybe fifty years from now we will encounter another new virus that will set up a new pandemic, we are in a modern era we should make something easy for the next generation.   

Have you traveled to 3rd world countries yet? Most of the infrastructure there are ancient and these people hardly have electricity and water, so you will not be able to go to these countries, if that was one of the requirements.

Also processes like this can easily be defrauded .... because there are always "humans" behind the capturing of this data that has to go onto the Blockchain. (Some Vaccines will also have to be repeated over and over again... ) 

As far as I can remember, there are several projects who already did this (or at least claimed that they're working on blockchain-based COVID passports). ID2020 might be the latest one that I know, they're working with some DPoS blockchain project if I recall correctly.

Pretty sure they won't use Bitcoin or Ethereum network since the cost might be way too much.

Blockchain does not change anything here. You have to have global database (something like excel sheet) or global software to add records to blockchain and the duty to teach thousands of people how to use the new system etc.

global centralized database might be close to free. Adding records to blockchain is expensive.

What for? Who would want to manipulate the information about who is vaccinated and who not, except for units that do not want to be vaccinated, but these will not have access to a centralized database anyway.

What blockchain change here? You will be able to add anything you want in there. You only would not be able to change anything.
And in the case of this blockchain application, you do not need to change anything in the blockchain to make it tampered, person resposible for adding records to add "mr xxx just received vaccine" while in fact he didn't.

Blockchain is expensive and should not be applied everywhere where it is possible.

Because you would need a world database, because the governments have incompatible systems, because it can be tampered with... I think you have not though this over.

It is completely different. For example, if I have been vaccinated by a health official, I will be given the credential about it (and remain to me alone), and also be validated on the decentralized ledger which can be verified through a form that will be given me with a specific cryptographic key which will serves as prove. The form with the specific cryptographic key key will be used to verify if truly I am recorded on the blockchain as one of the people that has been vaccinated. If I want to manipulate in this case, before I can manipulate anything, I will have to make a deal with a health official that do vaccinate people to help me validate a form with a cryptographic key on blockchain. Without this, no way to manipulate, but not compared to physical documents that I can make the fake ones from anywhere which is a lot easier.

This is a way our credentials (data) can be safe, it will remain with us than on a third party database, only the form will be on blockchain which has no credential of us. Unlike physical credentials in which blockchain is not used, there must be a database for collecting our vaccination data report. And the positive thing about this is that, it is the method suggested to be used, which will help protect peoples data from third party, although, still at its earliest age.

There, @franky1 already said it. Vaccine passports are just one time use so I agree with @franky1's argument that vaccine passport is useless. Not to mention that there are other anti-tampering tools that the government is using to prevent that possibility, you all act like the government hasn't encountered this kind of problem before just to justify that blockchain or anything related to it is needed. Not to mention that it would be a bother for the government who doesn't want unnecessary spending to create their own blockchain network or risk having to hitch in the current network that is already congested.

It is great idea, yes. But I do agree with you, most governments will find it difficult to implement as most of them don't even have the grasp of how blockchain technology works. But if one country will apply blockchain tech on this endeavor and be successful, that will be a good example to other countries, and can be replicated easy. We only need one country to implement blockchain tech on this task and be a guinea pig. I hope we will see that day to happen.

a blockchain is about chaining blocks where it can show a change of current status overtime via new blocks.. but traceable back to source, also works best if the entire network has all the data.

a covid certificate is a single entry that does not need to be 'spent' so needing new proceeding blocks is a useless feature.

there are other validation methods that dont use a chain and dont require all nodes to hold all data of the entire network

..
take simple message signing feature bitcoin uses.
imagine US health department has a list of registered vaccine centres.
it lists their public keys

having a registered vaccine centre sign a message that includes:
the persons passport number(no name no address no details. just number)
day
and what number in the vaccine queue

then each signature is unique and can be verified it was signed by a registered vaccine centre without needing to hold that data on a database
they just check the public key against the health department list.
then use the public key against the message and signature independently(no special network)

no databases no secret network. just signatures and public keys
the airline can then check the passport number in the message matches the passport number of the passenger. and boom. check complete. no vaccine database needed to be shared with airlines. no personal info revealed, no way for passengers to trade certificates

It's a good idea but with the time frame I don't think it can be implemented, vaccination is already implemented and now ongoing, every country has its own system, to track who gets it first and when he will get it, in my country alone with the limited incoming vaccine, we have set of people who will get it first, it will take a year before everybody here gets vaccinated.

This.

I don't see a good enough reason for blockchain to come in between of Covid-19 vaccination. Every country has their own way of vaccinating their people; Some of them use centralized medical record IDs that track each patient and their history.

And besides you're forgetting the point that all countries have started their vaccination process, upgrading their system midway through will only be chaos. Also, not everyone is equipped to understand blockchain. People find excel hard, let alone blockchain. I can make so many more arguments but this should suffice.

Read: Not everything needs to be decentralized. Not everything needs to be centralized. There needs to be a bridge across these two.

First of all, I will like to address the issue of third parties, with this method, our information are sold just like the way big companies like Amazon, Facebook and Google are selling our data. If big companies like these can sell our day, why can't other companies do just the same, of this way is continuingly to be followed, it will not let peoples private information to be safe, which is the reason we truly need decentralized identity.

Also it will be good to go against the use of physical documents because they can be easily forged
There will be nothing like "COVID" vaccine passports on a blockchain ID, nothing like individuals identity (be it passport or any other identity) that will be stored on the decentralized distributed ledger, it will be verifiable credentials that will be used, which is a form that does not contain any individual information but a form that validate that someone has been vaccinated, in this way, users data remains to the users privately.

I agree, a database would do (not really excel, but you have a point).

I was thinking at first that there's a risk that somebody could alter records there (make fake passports). But then somebody can just add records to blockchain and it's the same result.
And maintaining a database is much much easier and cheaper than for a blockchain.

Let's not use blockchains just for the sake of it, OK?

"Why not "COVID" vaccine passports on a blockchain ID" - because centralized database - simple excell sheet with ID and yes/no annotation in second column is good enough in such case. What extra use case bring blockchain here?

Plausible, but I think governments don't have the luxury of time to actually be exploring new areas of proving something just because the technology already exists. While nice to have a single scan to prove X already had vaccine, the transition towards such protocols would be hard on some citizens which aren't used to these things. Perhaps a gradual transition would be good, but right now stick to basics while the experts perfect the tech.

it would be a safe, secured, difficult to tamper and widely available method of travelling and proving that an individual has had a vaccine. No borders, no language, no need to carry papers around. just you bio linked a a recognised signature and you are good to fly. Perhaps this looks too futuristic, but the technology is already there and could be a great testing ground.