Archival Data

A Durable Record: Why Decentralised Storage is Vital for Web3 and Beyond

Nasrudin

Sep 26, 2024 • 5 min read

Our digital world now generates 400 million terabytes of data every day, and the vulnerabilities of centralised storage systems have become increasingly apparent. Decentralised storage offers a more efficient, censorship-resistant, and resilient solution for preserving data in the web3 era.

The risks of storing data with centralised parties are clear. Centralised storage providers may censor or restrict access to certain data stored on their servers. They may be required to share sensitive personal data or access and monetise it themselves. They also represent a single point of failure that may jeopardise the longevity and durability of important information.

The growth of web3 and the development of blockchain technology offer a more resilient, private, and fairer solution to digital citizens: decentralised storage. Decentralised storage distributes data across multiple locations and operators, ensuring it remains intact, accessible, and tamper-proof.

Among those leading the shift to decentralised storage is Codex, a decentralised durability engine and storage network that aims to allow files to be stored efficiently by a dynamic, peer-to-peer network of decentralised node operators incentivised to provide storage capacity and access to data.

Codex plans to allow anyone to store their data in a permanent, immutable record free from the vulnerabilities of centralised storage. One of the most immediate and impactful applications of a platform such as Codex would be cold (or archival) data storage – inactive data that users only need occasionally but must be preserved over the long term.

Let’s consider some of the ways decentralised storage providers like Codex could be used to persist a durable record of censorship-resistant data in the future.

Archival Enterprise or Personal Data

Data stored on centralised storage platforms is vulnerable to exploitation or surveillance, and it can be leaked if the single party with custody of that data is compromised, as evidenced by the myriad of data leaks that plague the modern data economy. Among the most famous data privacy scandals was the Cambridge Analytica controversy, where the personal data of more than 50 million Facebook users was harvested without their permission and used to direct political advertising.

On a decentralised, peer-to-peer storage platform, data can be stored in an entirely self-custodial and persistent manner. Individuals and enterprises can enjoy complete control over their sensitive data and confidence in its durability.

The archival data use cases for enterprises encompass everything from preserving government legislation and corporate records to safeguarding historical documents, financial statements, and digital communications.

Decentralised archival data could also be expanded to give users more control over how their data is shared and used by third parties. For example, a user may give an insurance provider access to their medical data while reserving the option to revoke the insurer’s access later.

By giving entities control over their own data, decentralised storage platforms can unlock powerful new ways for businesses and people to regain their digital sovereignty. If they wish, users with data stored on a platform such as Codex could choose to monetise a portion of their data through a DAO or similar structure.

Tamper-Proof Legal Documents

Legal documents, contracts, and agreements are highly sensitive and must remain free from manipulation while being preserved for future reference. Distributing these documents across a peer-to-peer network of storage providers ensures they remain available and accessible to the relevant parties.

The benefits of notarising government records and legal documents on blockchain are already being enjoyed by countries such as Estonia, which has implemented a digital identity document secured by blockchain technology.

Archival storage also protects these documents from being tampered with or deleted, with platforms like Codex ensuring they persist as immutably recorded data immune to retroactive changes.

The censorship-resistant qualities of decentralised storage are also relevant to preserving these documents, as they ensure accessibility to the relevant parties even if powerful counterparties or nefarious actors attempt to suppress them.

Censorship-Resistant Communications

Whether it is documents created and shared by whistleblowers or a history of communications on a decentralised social media platform, decentralised cold storage enables the preservation of important statements while rendering them immune to censorship from centralised parties.

This allows a durable record of free speech to be preserved even if a powerful entity would prefer that communication to be censored or deleted. When the Panama Papers leak was published online, entities implicated in the files were quick to censor discussion over the documents and to crack down on the files’ distribution. A robust decentralised, peer-to-peer storage network would make these files available to everyone and immune to censorship.

Longevity is also a powerful feature of the durability conferred by decentralised storage. It ensures that communications can be preserved in their original context for future reflection, giving people a clearer view of the evolution of public discourse that is invulnerable to later manipulation.

Decentralised Scientific Research

Historical data is critical in many data-intensive scientific fields, including climate change, epidemiology, geology, and demography. Research may need to be referenced in crucial studies centuries after its creation, and therefore, it should be stored on a durable and reliable platform resistant to centralised risks.

If used to persist scientific research, Codex could also confer censorship resistance to the data stored on its network, ensuring that academics enjoyed unrestricted access to important experiments and their underlying data in the future.

For example, if a decentralised storage network were to persist an updated record of Arctic Sea Ice data, the effects of climate change could be monitored well into the future and referenced without the threat of data being censored or repressed by authorities interested in repressing this data.

Archival Storage for Ethereum

Beyond personal or institutional data, the Ethereum blockchain presents a compelling use case for cold storage. As Ethereum’s ecosystem scales according to its long-term roadmap, it is clear that a decentralised archival storage solution is essential for the blockchain’s long-term viability.

Codex provides a solution. It offers a decentralised archival solution that aims to store Ethereum's immense record in a way that aligns with web3 principles of decentralisation. Decentralised storage protocols will help to ensure Ethereum’s historical digital ledger — and those of rollups — is preserved in a way that is scalable, durable, and future-proof.

For more about the role of decentralised storage in scaling the Ethereum network, read our previous blog post on the topic.

Join the Decentralised Storage Network

Codex is building a decentralised durability engine and storage network that uses a peer-to-peer model to deliver true censorship-resistant data storage.

Codex delivers robust data durability by implementing erasure coding to efficiently ensure data is always available without the storage cost of replication. It aims to incentivise the participation of both large and small data storage providers, ensuring a decentralised and, therefore, more durable and censorship-resistant network architecture.

The protocol is also designed to resist DDoS attacks, and participating in the network is highly accessible thanks to its bandwidth usage optimisations, which include a "lazy repair" recovery system and lightweight, ZK-based remote auditing.

By running Codex, you are playing a role in enabling and building this decentralised archive of durable knowledge.

The platform operates a public testnet, which you join today by downloading and running Codex on your machine.

To get started with Codex, visit the Codex Testnet Starter.