Quote from: 4emily on July 03, 2017, 01:54:22 PM

Quote from: kadscuk on June 22, 2017, 10:33:14 PM

So I have a few technical questions if I may on the blockchain technology, and how it fits into insurex:

As I understand (and please correct me if Im wrong), confidential private insurance information won't be stored on the blockchain itself, but in the Nosql storage instead? So things like pricing, parties involved in an insurance deal, addresses and contacts of people will be stored in Nosql and not on the blockchain?

But everything else data wise will be written onto the ethereum blockchain? So things like:

- the whole marketplace where people buy and sell (with smart contracts implemented)
- actual insurance contract information
- terms and conditions for insurance contracts which can be issued via smart contracts (like Corda is able to do for banks now)
- portfolio info
- analytics

So what you're doing is having a hybrid..where some data is on ethereum, but other data is kept on a normal database, and the two meet together in an UI, built on normal application languages (node.js etc).

So the follow on question then would be: what type of backups/redundancy or contingency plans will you have if the ethereum network has issues? For example, bottleneck issues which we've seen recently. If a lot of data is purely on ethereum, and ethereum slows down or has other problems (which is possible because its still a third party and a work-in-progress), companies wont be able to access what they want

In essence, how are you ensuring data integrity and the ability to access the information a company needs on insurex in case something goes wrong on the blockchain or somewhere else?

What are your anticipated insurance transaction volumes on the insurex platform once the concept takes off? Because ethereum at the moment is showing some slowdown at 300,000 transactions a day (obviously that will improve with updates)

I would think some insurance companies would also want to use a sidechain to store their insurance information. So have their own private blockchain maintained in the cloud which covers all its sensitive information etc instead of a centralised nosql concept. So they would get the benefits of blockchain, but also keep control over their data in case things go wrong with a more standard public blockchain tech like ethereum

Im thinking something like Factom's blockchain technology to store insurance information as an add-on to insurex would also be good, so data is stored securely in an independent way, but also a smart way.

So..insurex is a great concept but I have some questions there....it doesnt say enough in the whitepaper about the extent of the blockchain implementation and whether everything's been thought of in regards to contingencies and how the control, safety and security of the data on it will work

Bump

Hi,

Many thanks for these very detailed questions. Please see our responses below:

>> As I understand (and please correct me if Im wrong), confidential private insurance information won't be stored on the blockchain itself, but in the Nosql storage instead? So things like pricing, parties involved in an insurance deal, addresses and contacts of people will be stored in Nosql and not on the blockchain?

This is the approach we have have taken to meet various regulatory challenges related to for example GDPR.

>> So the follow on question then would be: what type of backups/redundancy or contingency plans will you have if the ethereum network has issues? For example, bottleneck issues which we've seen recently. If a lot of data is purely on ethereum, and ethereum slows down or has other problems (which is possible because its still a third party and a work-in-progress), companies wont be able to access what they want

This is a very critical issue for us. Our initial approach is to run a consortium blockchain which would lend itself well to the industry we are in. Data and process can still be shared by all the market participants who are connected in the consortium and we will be isolated from the issues we have been seeing on the public chain.

>> In essence, how are you ensuring data integrity and the ability to access the information a company needs on insurex in case something goes wrong on the blockchain or somewhere else?

Our team has extensive experience of providing mission-critical, fault-tolerant systems so we will leverage this experience to the fullest. Well-known techniques will be applied to ensure that we can provide a 24/7 marketplace. Hot standby's, load-balancing, multiple levels of redundancy would be part of this.

>> What are your anticipated insurance transaction volumes on the insurex platform once the concept takes off? Because ethereum at the moment is showing some slowdown at 300,000 transactions a day (obviously that will improve with updates)

It is very difficult to predict the volumes, even as an estimate. It will be driven by the number of participants and their size and activeness. What we don't anticipate millions of transactions a second but rather in the thousands per day.

>> I would think some insurance companies would also want to use a sidechain to store their insurance information. So have their own private blockchain maintained in the cloud which covers all its sensitive information etc instead of a centralised nosql concept. So they would get the benefits of blockchain, but also keep control over their data in case things go wrong with a more standard public blockchain tech like ethereum

Im thinking something like Factom's blockchain technology to store insurance information as an add-on to insurex would also be good, so data is stored securely in an independent way, but also a smart way.

Exactly our thinking.

>> So..insurex is a great concept but I have some questions there....it doesnt say enough in the whitepaper about the extent of the blockchain implementation and whether everything's been thought of in regards to contingencies and how the control, safety and security of the data on it will work

Thank you for these encouraging words. Yes it is early days yet and we're working very hard at trying to address many of these challenges. And we intentionally left the white paper light on specific details in some areas but will keep the community updated on our progress with this.

Regards,
InsureX - IS