Blockchain Firm HashCash Joins Healthcare-Focused NFT Project

HashCash Consultants, a blockchain development company, will be taking part in a new non-fungible token (NFT) creation project involving the healthcare industry and peoples’ health records, according to a Saturday (April 16) press release.

HashCash said it is partnering with a U.K.-based company to explore the idea, although that company isn’t named in the release. The concept involves individuals volunteering to have their health data made into NFTs, allowing them to share those NFTs with healthcare services to participate in studies or research.

Per the release, when an individual does things like order a DNA testing kit or get a nutrition plan based on their genetics, they’re sharing data and history with those companies — who can sell the records for research purposes while the original owner doesn’t get anything.

HashCash CEO Raj Chowdbury said that by turning the data into NFTs, the information is attached to a feature that can be tracked.

“This would enable you to monitor where your data ends up and track the people who hold the NFT and also figure out if it is being used without permission,” he said in the release.

In addition, the sole owner of the information could potentially enable a feature that pays them every time a transaction is done via the NFT.

PYMNTS wrote that HashCash announced last year that it was working alongside a Spanish supply chain company in order to replace its infrastructure with IoT-on-Blockchain architecture. According to the report, the impetus for this was because of the difficulties faced by supply chains.

Read more: HashCash Launches Spanish Supply Chain Project

“It is turning increasingly difficult to verify the source of raw materials and maintain visibility of products and merchandise while they are traveling through the value chain network,” the firm said at the time. “The integration of the Internet of Things (IoT) enables companies to observe, track and monitor products, activities and processes within their respective value chain networks.”

The IoT functionalities also come along with things like convenient product monitoring and optimizing operations for manufacturing, warehousing and other things. Chowdbury said blockchain tech, when integrated with IoT, can help boost the effectiveness of supply chains.