On Tuesday, in Tbilisi, the government of Georgia signed an agreement to use the Bitcoin Blockchain to verify property transactions.

Last April, the Georgian government and Bitcoin company BitFury initiated a project to record land titles on the Blockchain.

This is the first time a national government is using the Blockchain to safeguard and authenticate state operations, therefore ushering in a belief in the technology that has wrongfully been painted black.

First-time government Blockchain

As a matter of fact, the private Blockchain that will be an alter-proof ledger will also be provable using the Bitcoin Blockchain that is in the public domain.

As of now, a software has been built and tested on some land title registrations. The Georgian National Agency of Public Registry and BitFury signed a memorandum of understanding paving the way to extend services to the registration of new land titles, demolition of property, mortgages, purchases and sales of land titles, rentals as well as notary services.

There are many other projects focusing on Blockchain land title services apart from the BitFury and Republic of Georgia drive. This includes Sweden, Honduras and Cook County in Chicago which are being run by ChromaWay, Factcom and Velox respectively.

Media reports hinted that Peruvian Economist Hernando de Soto is associated with the Georgian project. De Soto, in his book Mystery of Capital, estimates that there is "dead capital" of $20 trillion globally, consisting of buildings and lands without legal title.

24/7 with smartphones

Georgia’s Minister of Justice, Tea Tsulukiani, says that she is optimistic her country will be able to work with Blockchain technology from this coming summer to have real estate quotations in a completely trustworthy and avant-garde.

Papuna Ugrekhelidze, chairman of the Georgian National Agency of Public Registry, stated in an announcement that his outfit is “very pleased with the technical progress and looks forward to continuing [their] fruitful collaboration.”

BitFury CEO Valery Vavilov also told the media that the Georgian government is excited about how the whole work was handled and executed with the current method. He explained that all the changes were made on the back end and the only dichotomy for the citizens of Georgia is that they can monitor if a title is legitimate when it is entered into the system.

Vavilov revealed that the current platform is phase one and at a beta stage but the software will be fully operational this year:

“The big goal is to move [the process] to smartphones, so people can use it 24/7 and all transactions are secured, transferrable and accountable.”

So far, BitFury has been able to raise $90 mln funding including a $30 mln investment by Credit China FinTech Holdings in January.

Implemented on a property, Blockchain technology maintains agreements in diverse fashions. In Blockchain-based entries, records are time-stamped, as well as consequent modifications to these records. The aforementioned would permit public members interested in a property to examine and establish the date of previous sales.