Towards the Development of a Blockchain System for Philippine Government Processes for Enhanced Transparency and Verifiability

Abstract

There are cases of corruption and fraud within the Philippine government that have gone under the radar, often due to a lack of transparency and verifiability. The objective of this study is to prototype a blockchain network that can run a government process as a decentralized application such that it can enhance transparency and verifiability in the public sector. This can be accomplished by identifying a government process that would be converted into a decentralized application. One of these processes would be converted into a decentralized application. Afterwards, a blockchain framework should be identified — one which can create a public permissioned blockchain network. This framework can be used to design and implement the prototype blockchain network which the decentralized application can run on. The final prototype constitutes of smart contracts deployed on an Ethereum test network with a web frontend to easily interact with it. Mechanisms of the application that are deemed necessary to transparency and verifiability of the system are also identified. Finally, the variable cost of the system and possible limitation is explored in the paper. In this regard, the prototype offers a foundation with which other decentralized applications can follow and build upon. This is to promote transparency and verifiability within and among government processes.