Archain: A de-centralised internet archive inside a cryptocurrency that truly scales

Archain, a new de-centralised cryptocurrency-based archiving system, has begun its token pre-sale period. Archain is a permanent and irrevocable archive, with additional support for cryptographically verifying the contents of webpages in a distributed manner. Once launched (in the first quarter of 2018), the Archain will be an uncensorable, irrevocable and unforgeable internet archive, making our digital human history retrievable at any time, by anyone.

In order to face the challenge of the internet-level scaling that Archain requires, the system employs novel Proof of Access and blockweave technologies. These technologies allow Archain to scale to levels far out of reach of traditional blockchain-based cryptocurrencies. By integrating data from randomly selected previous blocks into the mining of each new block, miners are financially incentivised to form a self-optimising network of storage and redundancy, creating a cryptocurrency that can rival the internet in scale. The details of these technologies can be found in the Archain whitepaper.

Archain also enables developers to build their own application nodes in the Archain network, using the App Developer Toolkit (already available, see here). Not only can these Archain apps make use of the permanence of the Archain network as a service, but they can also monitor the traffic in the network, receiving a live-feed of new and important webpages and documents. Example Archain applications range from automated stock trading systems to business intelligence analysis and uncensorable microblogging networks.

As the only truly de-centralised and untamperable archive, Archain is uniquely placed to become an important oracle of human history. Archain provides a level of verification unobtainable by traditional archives: not only are Archain documents impossible to tamper with during storage, but they are also cryptographically verified at the time of entry into the system. This will give users confidence that web pages and documents stored on the blockweave are exactly as they were presented on the internet at the time –- tens, or even hundreds of years later. As the ARC tokens associated with the Archain are required for its use as an archiving tool, the tokens will be positively impacted by the importance and prevalence of the data stored on the blockweave.

The Archain token pre-sale concludes on September 13th 2017, and the network launch is expected in the first quarter of 2018.