A “Secure Cloud Storage” drive is pictured at the CeBIT at the CeBIT, the world’s biggest IT fair, on March 3, 2011 in Hanover, central Germany. More than 4,200 tech firms from 70 countries are expected to attend this year’s CeBIT, with many of the big names that stayed away during the global financial crisis returning to Germany. The fair is running until March 5, 2011. AFP PHOTO / JOHANNES EISELE (Photo credit should read JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty Images)
Storj Labs is open for business. Tardigrade, Storj’s platform, is a decentralized cloud storage service and wants to challenge the likes of Amazon’s S3 Cloud Network.
If it works, data breaches like the 2017 Equifax personal information hack, could be next to impossible to pull-off. Better yet, the new business will pay you for your spare storage space.
We associate blockchain with Bitcoin. Cryptocurrency started using an encrypted public ledger broken into many pieces, or decentralized components, and then put back together with a private key. But its application continues to be applied in more exciting ways.
A decentralized cloud storage system, a form of decentralized technology similar to blockchain, encrypts data before being uploaded to the service and distributes each part globally. Storj breaks that data into 80 pieces, where only 30 of those parts are needed to create the original file. A hacker would need the key for each file, e.g., an individual’s information, as well as to compromise 30 distributed and random storage nodes; then, they would need to put it back together while decrypting each part. They would have to repeat the process for each subsequent file.
Consider the hackers trying to exploit a software flaw, like the 2017 Equifax hack, which exposed the personal information of 147 million people and resulted in $425 million fine to help people affected by the breach. To steal a file in a decentralized model, a malicious actor would need to compromise 30 different specific storage nodes out of thousands randomly distributed around the world, then separately obtain the encryption key for that file.
Storj’s Tardigrade platform is an open-source model. Partners provide their storage space to create the network. Ben Golub, Executive Chairman and Interim CEO at Storj Labs, said, “Our competitive advantage is that we compensate people fairly for their spare drive space.”
