The Korea Financial Investment Association has laid claim to the world’s first commercial blockchain smartphone application to allow users to access stock trade at multiple securities firms without the need for a verifying central certification.

On Tuesday, the association and 11 partner brokerages launched the implementation of Chain ID, a blockchain identification platform where a number of financial companies can securely share customer information for online identification.

It marks the first time in the world that financial companies have offered customers a decentralized platform for authentication, with which users can access services from multiple securities firms after logging just once. Blockchain certification’s renewal cycle is three years, much more convenient than the current central certification that requires renewal every year.

Blockchain, mainly used for private e-currency, is an open, peer-to-peer, decentralized software technology where transactions (blocks) are recorded, stored, confirmed anonymously in a public-wide accounting book called the ledger. The blockchain technology cannot be realistically hacked or altered.

The pilot service is supported by and available in 11 stock brokerages in Korea: Daewoo Securities, Meritz Securities, Shinhan Financial Investment, Yuanta Securities, Eugene Investment & Securities, E-Best Investment Securities, KB Securities, Kiwoom Securities, Hana Financial Investment, Korea Investment & Securities and Hanwha Investment & Securities. If a user goes through a blockchain-backed user authentication at one of these firms, the user don’t need to repeat the process in the other firms for mobile stock trade.

Once the current pilot program runs reliably and remains stable, the Chain ID service will be expanded to PC-based home trading systems and to other financial services such as banking, insurance and finance, according to the association.

By Hong Jang-won and Minu Kim

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