Blockchain Technology: Unlocking New Frontiers in Data Management and Transparency

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have been developed over the past few years as an impactful new digital asset class that allows both artists and cultural institutions to securely generate revenue from their digital creations while protecting them. However, limited research exists that fully addresses the integration of NFTs and smart contracts as a technological framework for preserving and promoting artistic and cultural heritage in Malaysia. While there has been much discussion about the economic advantages of NFTs paired with smart contracts, the technical backbone infrastructure remains largely unexplored in many ways for cultural preservation. The research explores NFTs and smart contracts to offer automated royalties and an unprecedented transfer of ownership system with cultural impact. This research, through a mixed-method approach-including a literature review, interviews with experts, and the formulation of relevant mathematical models-conducted an analysis of how smart contracts automate the NFT transaction and royalty distribution. The results have so far shown that, underpinned by blockchain technology, NFTs can offer a promising solution to present and future Malaysian artists and cultural institutions in ensuring the authenticity and financial viability of traditional and modern forms of art. Besides that, scalability, environmental concerns, and legal frameworks are several sober challenges to widespread adoption. Finally, this research concludes that NFTs and smart contracts have the potential to revolutionize Malaysia's cultural economy by offering a sustainable model for heritage preservation and a supporter of the arts in general.

The global supply chain landscape has evolved significantly in recent years, becoming increasingly complex and vulnerable to various challenges such as fraud, counterfeiting, information asymmetry, and inefficient processes The purpose of this research is to ascertain how blockchain technology might raise the efficacy and security of supply chain management. This article integrates concepts from information technology, logistics, and business management to investigate the potential applications of blockchain in supply chain management. It looks at organisational and regulatory issues along with technological aspects of blockchain implementation, like consensus algorithms and smart contracts. Furthermore, the research project assesses case studies and real-world examples where blockchain has been successfully deployed in supply chain operations. By analyzing these cases, the project aims to identify best practices, potential pitfalls, and lessons learned, offering insights for organizations considering blockchain adoption in their supply chain processes. Ultimately, this research contributes to the growing body of knowledge about how blockchain technology may revolutionise supply chain management and emphasises the importance of collaboration among industry players.

This research explores the transformative role of blockchain technology in ensuring secure and trustworthy digital transactions. With the increasing reliance on digital platforms across industries such as finance, healthcare, and supply chains, blockchain has emerged as a solution to the challenges posed by traditional centralized systems, including data breaches, fraud, and lack of transparency. The study investigates blockchain's decentralized structure, cryptographic security features, consensus mechanisms, and smart contracts to evaluate how it enhances data integrity and trust in digital transactions. A qualitative approach was employed, utilizing case studies and a comprehensive review of existing literature. The results show that blockchain’s decentralization significantly reduces single points of failure, while its consensus mechanisms and smart contracts increase trust and automate transactions. However, challenges such as scalability, energy consumption, and regulatory concerns remain. The research highlights blockchain’s potential for transforming digital transactions but calls for further innovation to address these issues. The findings suggest that blockchain has the capacity to revolutionize secure transactions across various sectors but requires continued development to achieve widespread adoption and scalability.

Firms are eager to adopt new technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence (A.I.), Cloud Computing, Big Data, etc., as they witness successful business applications. As one of the disruptive technologies, Blockchain technology (BCT) has been drawing attention stemming from cryptocurrency proliferation (e.g., Bitcoin and Ethereum), for which Blockchain serves as the backbone. However, the public is haunted by the bewilderment between cryptocurrencies and BCT. Furthermore, the burgeoning of Metaverse and non-fungible tokens (NFT) has raised BCT to another notch. This study conducts a holistic literature review on BCT features, implementations, and business implications. In particular, by reviewing and analyzing 2265 up-to-date articles that reveal BCT’s applications across various fields, this Blockchain-centered study reveals the research status and delineates future research directions. It is shown that, among various characteristics of BCT, traceability is the main characteristic fueling BCT’s application in supply chain management (SCM). We further find that the BCT-related research has been extremely growing in SCM, healthcare, and government, while declining in the areas of banking and cyber security. Geographically, the top countries with BCT-related publications are China, U.S., and India. Finally, it is emphasized that BCT-related research in environmental sciences and agriculture have potential to be explored.

Blockchain technology has emerged in e-business as a revolutionary force in the realm of cybersecurity, offering novel solutions to the escalating challenges posed by the ever-evolving modern technology landscape. This study delves new e-business into the critical determinants that drive the application of blockchain technology in enhancing cybersecurity. With the proliferation of digital assets and sensitive information, safeguarding data integrity, confidentiality, and accessibility has become paramount. The research employs a multidisciplinary approach in e-business, drawing from the fields of cybersecurity, blockchain technology, and data management. It examines the intricate interplay between blockchain's fundamental features and their direct impact on fortifying cybersecurity measures. Key determinants explored include: Decentralization: Blockchain's decentralized architecture reduces the vulnerability of a single point of failure, rendering it more resilient against cyberattacks. Immutable Ledger: The immutable ledger ensures the integrity of stored data, making it exceptionally challenging for malicious actors to tamper with information. Smart Contracts in E-Business: The automation capabilities of smart contracts enhance the enforcement of security protocols, bolstering the protection of digital assets. Cryptography: Robust cryptographic techniques underpin blockchain security, safeguarding data from unauthorized access. Transparency: The transparent nature of blockchain allows for real-time monitoring and auditing, facilitating the early detection of security breaches. Data Privacy: Blockchain's data privacy features, including permissioned networks and zero-knowledge proofs, address concerns surrounding privacy in cybersecurity. The study also investigates real-world applications and e-business of blockchain technology in cybersecurity across industries, from financial services to healthcare and supply chain management. It highlights successful case studies and identifies the challenges and limitations faced in implementing blockchain solutions. In conclusion, this research underscores the transformative potential of blockchain technology in e-business by fortifying cybersecurity measures. By examining the critical determinants that drive its application, organizations and policymakers can make informed decisions regarding the adoption of blockchain to enhance cybersecurity in the modern technology era. The study encourages further exploration and innovation in this dynamic and rapidly evolving field to secure our digital future.

Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs) have emerged as a significant innovation in the digital economy, particularly in India, where the intersection of art, technology, and finance is evolving rapidly. NFTs are unique digital tokens secured through blockchain technology, representing ownership of digital or physical assets such as art, music, collectibles, and virtual real estate. Their rise in India is marked by increasing participation from creators, investors, and technology platforms.Despite their growing popularity, NFTs operate within a fragmented and ambiguous legal environment. India currently lacks specific legislation dedicated to NFTs, leading to reliance on existing laws such as the Indian Contract Act, 1872; the Information Technology (IT) Act, 2000; intellectual property laws; and provisions in the Finance Act, 2022 concerning virtual digital assets. However, these frameworks offer limited clarity on issues such as copyright ownership, contract enforceability via smart contracts, taxation, and consumer protection.This research paper undertakes a comprehensive examination of the legal standing of NFTs in India. It evaluates the applicability of current legal instruments, identifies regulatory and operational gaps, and explores international best practices. The study also emphasizes the need for a clear, forward-looking legal framework that fosters innovation while ensuring adequate safeguards against fraud, misuse, and environmental concerns. A balanced regulatory approach is essential for India to harness the full potential of NFTs and position itself as a leader in the digital asset economy.

The convergence of blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), and cloud computing is catalyzing a paradigm shift in developing secure, intelligent, and scalable digital infrastructures. This triad of technologies is increasingly utilized to improve performance, transparency, and trust in engineering-driven and socio-technical environments. This study systematically reviews the evolution, integration strategies, and applications of blockchain, AI, and cloud computing in digital ecosystems. The analysis is based on 108 peer-reviewed studies spanning the years 2012 to 2025. A comprehensive literature analysis was conducted to identify trends, synergies, and sector-specific implementations of these systems. The review explores how their integration supports real-world engineering and operational use cases. Blockchain contributes to decentralized architectures, secure data exchange, and identity verification. AI supports adaptive behavior, autonomous decision-making, and predictive analytics. Cloud computing offers the scalable infrastructure necessary for deployment. Key challenges addressed include interoperability, latency, security trade-offs, and resource allocation. Use cases in digital finance, supply chain management, and industrial automation demonstrate the effectiveness of this integration in building resilient, ethically aligned, and high-performance infrastructures. The findings offer valuable insights and technical considerations for engineers and architects seeking to design next-generation cyber-physical systems that are secure, intelligent, and socially responsive. Clinical Trial Number Not applicable. This article accentuates the extensive use of blockchain, cloud computing, and AI principles, emphasizing their crucial significance in the contemporary digital environment and paths in which blockchain technology may be employed to automate financial transactions, enhance the security of personal data and records, facilitate cross-border transactions, verify identities, execute smart contracts, utilize cryptocurrencies, and manage supply chains. This research systematically assesses the development and practical application of blockchain, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence technologies over the past decade. This study primarily focuses on monitoring the progress, practical applications, and benefits of blockchain technology in the context of financial transactions. This article probes the symbiotic relationship between artificial intelligence, cloud and blockchain technology, analyzing the evolution and fundamental concepts of their integration from 2012 to 2025. This paper also presents a detailed analysis of 108 research works acquitted over the past decade. The study provides a comprehensive examination of the current state and fundamental principles related to the integration of artificial intelligence, cloud, and blockchain technology. This paper offers a comprehensive analysis of the major obstacles confronted by blockchain technology, examining its wide-ranging applications over several industries and its socko role in transaction systems and the domain of cryptocurrencies.

As the mobility of global capital is getting higher, more and more investors tend to invest in overseas real estate. However, the conventional model of investing in real estate possesses several disadvantages including high entry hurdles, low levels of market liquidity, and low transparency, particularly for retail investors. This article will seek to establish how blockchain technology as applied in smart contracts can help in the clarification of unclear fragmented investments in overseas property. First of all, this paper begins with the definition and examples of applying conventional and advanced blockchain technology and then describes the work of smart contracts and the comparison between regular contracts and smart contracts. The paper also evaluates the nature of fragmented investment in overseas property and its associated risks before suggesting the use of blockchain and smart contracts for a new institutional structure of the investment platform. This study demonstrates how the technologies can advance data sec, promote trust in transactions, and how investment can be automated. It can be concluded that blockchain technology, and smart contracts, can enhance Overseas Real Estate Investment by increasing transparency and decreasing the investment threshold as well as the instances of fraud. This study also presents an analysis of the potential difficulties that may be encountered in real-world applications and a recommendation of what may be done in subsequent studies. On one hand, this research offers a new perspective to the theoretical world, on the other hand, it offers practical problems and solutions to the practitioners who are a part of overseas real estate markets and businesses by steadily helping the overseas real estate markets to move in the fairer and more transparent direction.

Blockchain technology, originally developed for digital currencies, has evolved to offer transformative prospects for enhancing financial security and efficiency beyond its initial application. This review paper explores the expansive utility of blockchain technology across various domains, with a special focus on its implications for green logistics innovations within the oil industry, drawing a comparative analysis between Nigeria and the USA. Through a comprehensive review of existing literature, this study aims to uncover the multifaceted impact of blockchain on streamlining operations, ensuring transparency, and fostering sustainability in the oil sector's supply chain management.
 The methodology hinges on synthesizing findings from peer-reviewed articles, industry reports, and case studies to construct a holistic view of blockchain's role in mitigating traditional challenges faced by the oil industry, such as fraud, inefficiencies, and environmental concerns. By comparing the progress and setbacks in Nigeria and the USA, the paper delineates the influence of regulatory frameworks, technological infrastructure, and stakeholder engagement on the adoption and effectiveness of blockchain solutions.
 Key findings reveal that blockchain technology can significantly elevate financial security and operational efficiency, offering a robust framework for transparent, immutable transactions and supply chain oversight. However, the comparative analysis highlights a notable divergence in adoption levels and outcomes, attributed to varying degrees of technological readiness, regulatory environments, and commitment to sustainability goals between the two countries.
 Conclusively, the paper emphasizes that the broader application of blockchain in enhancing green logistics and sustainability within the oil industry requires a concerted effort among policymakers, industry leaders, and technology providers. It advocates for targeted investments in technology infrastructure, clearer regulatory guidelines, and stronger collaborations to harness blockchain's full potential, suggesting a pathway towards more secure, efficient, and sustainable industry practices.
 Keywords: Blockchain Technology, Financial Services, Smart Contracts, Decentralized Finance (Defi), Regulatory Landscape, Ethical Considerations, Privacy Concerns, Data Protection, User Anonymity, Operational Efficiency, Financial Security, Scalability Issues, Energy Consumption, Consensus Mechanisms, International Regulations, Jurisdiction-Specific Challenges, Technology Adoption, Integration Strategies, Innovation, Collaboration, Financial Ecosystem.

Digital manufacturing (DM) is actively adopted to the production lifecycles of a variety of critical industries, and this rapid growth has resulted in exponential increase of 3D computer-aided design (CAD) models. Unfortunately, counterfeiting of intellectual property becomes a prominent threat as many 3D designs are accessible online, combined with the proliferation of cheap consumer 3D printers that enable malicious actors to produce non-authentic parts. State-of-the-art techniques to secure manufacturing processes mostly rely on watermarking, which embeds hidden information inside CAD models to prove ownership and authenticity. Nevertheless, such techniques tamper with the model itself, while existing attacks allow removing such watermarks altogether. To address these shortcomings, we integrate signal processing and cryptographic techniques and describe a tailored solution for CAD model ownership and supply chain management. Our approach generates unique identifiers for 3D designs using frequency-domain transforms and employs non-fungible tokens (NFTs) that persist on public distributed ledgers. Our NFTs are implemented on the Ethereum blockchain using smart contracts and their functionality is twofold: (a) authenticate the owner of a CAD model, and (b) enable ownership transfer. To validate our technique, we deployed our smart contract on Ethereum's proof-of-work Ropsten network and demonstrated the applicability of our methodology.

The worldwide education landscape has transformed due to the COVID-19 pandemic, providing an opportunity to enhance virtual learning. Nevertheless, this transition has disadvantages, including less face-to-face interaction and the possibility of student seclusion. The metaverse, a digital realm, provides an optimal substitute for conventional virtual education. Nevertheless, its immersive nature poses issues for conventional digital learning management systems. This article proposes using blockchain technology and non-fungible tokens (NFTs) as unique identifiers to handle credentials and transactions in the metaverse while ensuring security effectively. This approach tackles difficulties associated with the administration of certificates, including issuing, maintaining records, ensuring traceability, and preserving integrity. Additionally, it establishes a fairly secure setting that effectively prevents data manipulation. The proposed approach entails the implementation of a smart contract that integrates a credential’s transactions and an attribute-based access control mechanism. The research further addresses the challenge of limited storage resources caused by the dynamic nature of the metaverse and the requirement to manage huge quantities of data. The implementation results and applicability assessment confirm the feasibility of the proposed approach. Eventually, this study contributes to the ongoing discussion on the convergence of blockchain, NFTs, and smart contracts with its new perspective on digital learning management in the metaverse platform.

The unprecedented growth of digital art in the contemporary creative economy has empowered artists to reach global audiences, yet it has simultaneously amplified threats of copyright infringement, piracy, and unauthorized duplication. Traditional intellectual property frameworks, while legally robust, are often ill-suited to address the speed, borderless nature, and technological complexity of digital content circulation. Blockchain technology emerges as a transformative paradigm, introducing decentralized and tamper-proof mechanisms for digital rights management. Through non-fungible tokens (NFTs), smart contracts, and immutable ledgers, blockchain provides verifiable proof of authorship, facilitates transparent provenance tracking, and automates royalty distribution without reliance on intermediaries. This manuscript critically examines the role of blockchain in strengthening copyright protection for digital artists by combining an extensive review of existing literature with statistical survey data drawn from practicing artists across multiple regions. Findings reveal that while blockchain adoption is gaining momentum, barriers such as regulatory uncertainty, high transaction costs, energy inefficiency, and limited user literacy constrain large-scale implementation. The study demonstrates that blockchain can enhance creative autonomy, ensure fair economic participation, and foster trust in digital art ecosystems, but its success depends on legal integration, sustainable infrastructure, and artist-centered governance. This research contributes to the discourse by offering a multi-layered framework for blockchain-enabled copyright systems, bridging technological innovation with socio-legal realities, and outlining directions for future policy and research in intellectual property protection.

Can We Connect? Benefits and Barriers to Adoption of Transformative Technology in Global Supply Chains

Блокчейн у системі охорони здоров’я: проблеми правового забезпечення

Blockchain technology and smart contracts are emerging as transformative tools for enhancing transparency and efficiency in supply chain management and vendor relations. Traditional supply chains often face challenges such as inefficiencies, lack of transparency, and susceptibility to fraud (Kouhizadeh & Sarkis, 2018). Blockchain, a decentralized ledger technology, coupled with smart contracts, which are self-executing contracts with the terms directly written into code, offers promising solutions to these challenges (Wang, Han, & Beynon-Davies, 2019). This paper explores the application of blockchain and smart contracts in these domains, examining their potential to provide immutable records, streamline processes, and mitigate risks (Casado-Vara et al., 2018). Through a comprehensive analysis of current literature and case studies, we identify key benefits including improved transparency, enhanced efficiency, and better risk management (Christidis & Devetsikiotis, 2016; Tian, 2016). Our findings suggest that blockchain and smart contracts can significantly improve supply chain transparency and vendor management, though their implementation requires careful consideration of technical, regulatory, and organizational factors (Saberi et al., 2019). Notable case studies, such as Walmart’s blockchain pilot for food safety and De Beers' diamond tracking initiative, illustrate the practical benefits and challenges of adopting these technologies in real-world scenarios (Casino, Dasaklis, & Patsakis, 2019; Kshetri, 2018). Despite the promising outlook, further research is needed to address scalability, interoperability, and regulatory compliance issues to fully realize the potential of blockchain and smart contracts in supply chain management (Hughes et al., 2019).