DHS S&T awards contract for blockchain security development

Vienna, Austria-based Danube Tech GmbH has secured a $143,478 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Science and Technology Directorate (S&T) contract to develop blockchain security technology.

The award is funded through S&T’s Silicon Valley Innovation Program (SVIP) Other Transaction Solicitation Preventing Forgery & Counterfeiting of Certificates and Licenses, which seeks blockchain and distributed ledger technology (DLT) solutions to fulfill a common need across DHS missions.

“Danube Tech is building core interoperability infrastructure for issuers and verifiers,” SVIP Technical Director Anil John said. “Interoperability between blockchains is enabled by using emerging World Wide Web Consortium standards to globally resolve and find information where it exists on a particular blockchain.”

DHS officials maintain that current issuance processes are generally paper-based, do not facilitate data exchange, and could be susceptible to loss, destruction, forgery, and counterfeiting. Because of this, S&T is exploring the application of blockchain and DLT to issue credentials digitally.

The option would enhance security, ensure interoperability, and prevent forgery and counterfeiting.

Danube Tech GmbH will be responsible for integrating interoperability support for multiple credential data formats, blockchains and standardized and open application programming interfaces into existing decentralized identifier (DID) registrar for credential issuance and identity verification.