Blockchain as a database for training certifications

Question

I work in a company where in order to send staff to the field, employees have to comply with a certification that expires each 4 years, which probably employees did in their previous job, but the previous job just provided a letter that could be falsified, also, others companies don't spend time and resources to share their databases advocating security for the sensitiveness of data (names, nationality, id, company (including governments), date completion), centralization is a risk they don't want to take. As this is a training that is the same, and conducted everywhere that produces a contract between the company and the person, that expires in 4 years, but the person would like to be able to certify itself with the other companies, I was wondering if there is such implementation in the blockchain world, where writers, public ones, with no interest in 3rd parties, but in consensus due to the training nature, are willing to write/read the transaction on a secure manner providing a "self-service" among producers and consumers.

Answer 1

Assuming the other companies want to participate in the scheme, it is perfectly plausible to use some blockchain solution. You might want to use Hyperledger Fabric to create a privately permissioned blockchain network between the relevant stakeholders.

However don't get sucked into the blockchain hype, evaluate objectively whether the rest of the business processes also fit in the paradigm. Can certifications be revoked? Are there regulations on what data you can store on the employees and rights they have to get their data erased?

There might be many other simpler solutions that achieve the same thing. If the company or training provider just has a private key that signs certificates (PDF?) it might already be enough to solve your letter falsification issue.

Maybe each company could host its list of certified trained people on its own repository which could be queried, such that the list of certified people is maintained up to date (and any revocations can also be handled online), would probably achieve exactly the same result. Just like most other blockchain use-cases, there is a simpler solution that achieves the same thing, and is probably more flexible to fit the rest of the business processes.

Finally, before engaging in too much effort, make sure the other third parties are on-board. Do they really want to share the list of people they trained with competitors? If there is a likelihood they will not play along the project will probably be DOA. Case in point what happened here: https://www.coindesk.com/ibm-blockchain-maersk-shipping-struggling/