Trust Across Boundaries: Blockchain-Based Data Integrity Verification for Reliable Vessel Performance Assessment

Trustworthy operational data (e.g., via sensors) are essential for reliable vessel performance assessment via DNV's ship performance indicator Vessel Technical Index (VTI), which is a data-driven method to assist ship stakeholders such as shipowners and charterers in monitoring the operational ship energy efficiency. To ensure the trustworthiness and reliability of VTI's accuracy, the integrity of input data should be guaranteed, i.e., the input data for calculating VTI should be verified to be the same data as collected from the vessels. This paper presents a blockchain-based data integrity verifier that enhances trust in maritime operational data across maritime stakeholders, e.g., ship owners and third-party roles like DNV. The verifier consists of three key components in the context of VTI, which include: 1) data hashing, i.e., onboard collected data (e.g., via sensors) such as shaft power, resistance and weather conditions are first hashed followed by storing hash (e.g., transaction ID) into a blockchain; 2) data verification, i.e., the data to be used for calculating VTI is hashed and cross-checked against the hash record fetched from the blockchain; and 3) user layer, i.e., users can interact with the verifier by inputting data for verification. A red alert is returned when the two hashes (i.e., the hash of the data to be verified hash fetched from the blockchain) differ, which enable users to check potential causes of inconsistent data before utilizing for VTI calculation. The architecture of the verifier is also discussed together with a demonstrating use case of VTI. The proposed data verifier aims at strengthening data confidence (and reducing risk) for reliable and trustworthy VTI when assessing ship performance. Beyond VTI, the verifier can also be employed in other contexts, e.g., data-driven risk assessment for reliable, safe and secure maritime digital systems.

Keywords: data integrity verification, vessel performance assessment, blockchain, data confidence and trustworthiness.