Introduction
Blockchain technology came into the picture with the advent of cryptocurrencies. Since the value of cryptocurrencies is increasing exponentially day by day, people have started exploring its base technology, which is Blockchain. Blockchain has a lot of use cases in various industries say Supply chain, healthcare, agriculture, energy, data storage. In spite of all the use cases and numerous numbers of projects, consortiums in action today still the technology is considered to be nascent. Any technology takes time to reach masses, but Blockchain has certain hindrances that are stopping it from mass adoption. Let’s see some of them below.
No Universal Use Case
People often compare Blockchain as a new age internet. Just as the Internet changed the world forever, Blockchain is considered to do the same in the digital world. The Internet was created to provide information worldwide with the worldwide web. It created an industry for itself and reigned it. When it comes to Blockchain, it doesn’t have an industry of its own. It surely promises enough to revolutionize most of the existing sectors, but if there were one industry of its own, then the adoption and results would have been very promising. The combination of next-generation technologies, Artificial intelligence, machine learning, Blockchain, and the Internet of things may create an industry of its own that could be revolutionary.
Complicated Usage
The technology is quite complicated to use provided its secure nature. To perform a transaction in the bitcoin network, there should be an address with a string of numbers, wallets, transaction time, transaction fees, and a lot of stuff. All this terminology is pretty new to a novice user and finds it pretty challenging to use. Mass adoption will be possible only if we educate people enough. Most of the people know about Blockchain only through cryptocurrencies, and that notion should change. People should understand that Blockchain is much more than just cryptocurrencies.
Scalability
One of the significant issues with mass adoption is scalability, i.e., the number of transactions per second (TPS). When we take cryptocurrencies, the original bitcoin blockchain processed only 7 TPS. As the adoption of cryptocurrencies increased, processing time and transaction fees increased drastically, which will discourage people from using cryptocurrencies. Visa/Mastercard supports 24000 TPS, which is used worldwide and is very reliable. Even though some platforms are claiming 40000 TPS, we should check whether they are safe enough or not.
Standardization of Smart Contracts
Smart contracts have received popularity, and many enterprises have started using the same for their business needs. But there is no standardization, and there are a lot of vulnerabilities when it comes to smart contracts. The code is not standard. There is a scope for a lot of vulnerabilities. Hence if certain standards are established like formal verification of contracts to check vulnerabilities, the security of the system increases more.
Energy Consumption Issues
It is a well-known fact that proof of work, which is mainly used in bitcoin blockchain as of today, consumes a lot of energy. Environmentalists throughout the world are entirely against it. Hence the usage of energy friendly consensus algorithms like proof of stake should be used if mass adoption is to be made. Recently Ethereum has shifted to proof of stake from proof of work, which is a welcome move.
Regulation by Governments
Finally, governments should agree or accept the trade, registrations, or any legal matter of the sort to be done in blockchain platforms. As per the government rules, if certain transactions should be done only on paper, then it is not possible to use Blockchain. Governments across the world are at least trying to regularize cryptocurrency, considering the widespread usage. Hence, technology use in other aspects should also be considered.
These are some of the reasons that are holding back the mass adoption of this amazing technology. It is important to note that there is a lot of research and development being done in this space to overcome the above-mentioned hurdles.