Governor Phil Murphy signed the Blockchain Initiative Task Force, into law in bill S2297 on  Friday. The essence of the task force commissioned is for studying potential use-cases for blockchain technology on the state and local level. 
 
The content of the bill specifically points out medical records, land records, banking, and property auctions as potential applications.
 
It consists of 14 appointed members. The task force also has 180 days to file a study to the governor’s office and the state’s committee on science, tech, and innovation as pert of the process for the implementation.
 
The bill was first drafted in March 2018, it passed the New Jersey Senate and later the assembly with all onboard.
 
Interestingly, the State-level interest in blockchain technology has increased over the past few years, particularly due to cybersecurity threats.
 
Citing what happened in the Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) for instance, which was hit by a cyber threats in November 2018. With some 400 servers affected and the infrastructure closed up.
 
This has been the case as data are in many cases being compromised as State officials who often find data compromises a large issue.
Gov. John Hickenlooper called the first-ever state cybersecurity tech emergency regarding the problem. 
 
The state-level IT departments are looking for a more secure way to share information as multiple entities in government needing access to data files continues to increase.

From our reports, Colorado’s IT department says blockchain technology could be a potential solution to this considering  its unique structures. 
 

Credit: William Foxley