TL;DR: Governments use blockchain to keep records that nobody can quietly change: audit trails, education credentials, digital identity and data shared between authorities. The European Commission lists those four as the first use cases of the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (EBSI), and Estonia has KSI Blockchain deployed in its government networks. In Sweden, Bolagsverket built Proof of Business with TRUE Original in eight weeks and then received a government mandate for a second phase.
Blockchain is used in government to make public records tamper-evident and checkable by anyone, without a phone call to the agency that issued them. The European Commission names four initial use cases for its European Blockchain Services Infrastructure: notarisation, diplomas, European digital identity and trusted data sharing between authorities. Each answers the same need: a citizen, a company or another country has to trust a record it did not create.
The mechanics are simple. A public body writes a cryptographic fingerprint of a record to a ledger that many independent parties hold copies of. Change one character in the record and the fingerprint no longer matches. Databases can be compromised. Internal modifications, external breaches, or system migrations can alter records without detection. The record can stay in the agency's own systems, while the ledger proves that it has not changed since the moment it was registered.
The European Commission states the ambition in one sentence on its EBSI page:
"The European public sector is building its own blockchain services infrastructure, which should soon be interoperable with private sector platforms." European Commission, European blockchain services infrastructure (page updated 9 July 2025)
Outside Europe the uses run from vehicle titles to birth records. According to the Brookings Institution in June 2025, California's Department of Motor Vehicles "has since used blockchain to digitize 42 million car titles and detect fraud", Sutter County in California has deployed blockchain to issue birth and death records, and at least 19 US states have set up official study groups on the technology. In Sweden, Bolagsverket built Proof of Business with TRUE Original in eight weeks.
Blockchain technology for government is a shared ledger on which a public body records that a document, decision or data set existed in a specific form at a specific time. Blockchain records exist across thousands of independent computers worldwide. Nobody can rewrite an entry afterwards without the change showing, including the agency that made it. For a citizen, that turns "trust the agency" into a check anyone can run.
Estonia uses it this way. The e-Estonia site, run by the Estonian Business and Innovation Agency, puts it bluntly: "With KSI Blockchain deployed in Estonian government networks, history cannot be rewritten by anybody and the authenticity of the electronic data can be mathematically proven." According to the same page, the technology was developed in 2007.
In government services, blockchain is used wherever one authority's record has to be trusted by another authority, a business or a citizen working in a different system or a different country. The European Commission's four initial EBSI use cases show the range:
The Commission adds that EBSI "will allow public organisations to develop applications that connect to and make use of the EBSI infrastructure", and that it will later be extended to private organisations. National agencies are not waiting for that. Sweden's Bolagsverket has already made business documents verifiable with TRUE Original.
EBSI, the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure, is a peer-to-peer network of nodes that European governments run to deliver blockchain-based public services. According to the European Commission, each member of the European Blockchain Partnership will run at least one node: the 27 EU countries, Norway, Liechtenstein and the Commission itself. The partnership was launched in 2018 to develop and deploy EBSI.
The Commission calls EBSI "the first EU-wide blockchain infrastructure driven by the public sector". In May 2024 a consortium of nine Member States formed a new legal entity, EUROPEUM-EDIC, which uses the EBSI infrastructure for cross-border public services in line with the European Digital Identity framework, according to the Commission's page on the European Blockchain Partnership.
A blockchain digital credential is a diploma, licence, certificate or membership whose fingerprint is anchored on a public blockchain, so anyone can confirm that it has not changed since the issuer published it. The holder carries a link or a file. The blockchain carries the proof. No personal data goes on the blockchain: TRUE Original writes only the document's fingerprint there. A verifier sees who issued a TRUE Original document from the address it opens on, which can be the issuer's own domain, and a diploma sealed by TRUE also carries an eIDAS qualified electronic seal, which gives it a legal presumption of origin.
Diplomas are one of EBSI's first four use cases for that reason. The Commission's own description of the diplomas use case reads: "Giving control back to citizens when managing their education credentials, significantly reducing verification costs and improving authenticity trust".
TRUE Original issues blockchain digital credentials of this kind: certificates, diplomas, licences, memberships, transcripts and awards. TRUE Original has issued over 900,000 documents for more than 200 issuers in over 15 countries. Every TRUE document is anchored on several public blockchains, among them Ethereum and Polygon, and a public body that needs a specific chain can have it. What blockchain certificates are covers the technology in more depth.
Blockchain credential verification compares the document in front of you with the fingerprint written to the blockchain when it was issued: if the two match, the document is unchanged. With TRUE Original, the holder shares a link or a QR code, and anyone can open the TRUE document on the issuer's own domain or paste the link, document ID or PDF into TRUE Verify. Citizens, employers, or other agencies can verify instantly with any smartphone. No app required. No account needed. TRUE Verify is free and open to everyone, needs no account, and gives a security level rating in seconds.
For an agency, that takes verification off the switchboard. An employer, a bank or an authority in another country checks the document themselves. Nobody at the agency answers an email to confirm it.
Blockchain in government creates a privacy problem only when personal data is written to the chain, because an entry on a public blockchain cannot be deleted. The Brookings Institution warned in June 2025 that "Blockchain's immutability, while valuable for security purposes, raises data privacy concerns" that may conflict with laws on the right to deletion. TRUE Original writes only a fingerprint of each document to the blockchain, and no personal data is stored on the blockchain itself.
Nackademin, which issues its diplomas through TRUE, puts it plainly: no student data goes to a public chain (Nackademin case). The public check works the same way, because TRUE Verify needs no account and stores nothing beyond the verification result.
Bolagsverket, the Swedish Companies Registration Office, built a concept called Proof of Business with TRUE Original in eight weeks, and then received a government mandate to investigate a second phase. Proof of Business turns official business documents into secure digital records that anyone can verify. This pilot demonstrates that TRUE meets the security, compliance, and operational standards required by government agencies.
The idea came out of the pandemic. New company registrations surged, and a founder was collecting certificates and permits from several agencies, each in its own format. Bolagsverket wanted one digital place where an entrepreneur could reach every document they needed, securely.
"With the help of TRUE, setting up our concept Proof of Business took eight weeks." Erika Sjödin, Innovation Officer, Bolagsverket
The second phase covers licences, trademark certificates and company registrations: the documents businesses are asked to prove most often. The full story is in the Bolagsverket case study.
Yes. A TRUE Original document can carry an eIDAS qualified electronic seal and a blockchain anchor at the same time, because TRUE Value Software AB has held its own eIDAS Qualified Electronic Seal (QSeal) certificate since May 2026. The two do different jobs. The qualified seal gives the document a legal presumption of origin and integrity, recognised in all 27 EU member states, and the blockchain anchor gives anyone a permanent, independent check. TRUE meets EU requirements for electronic identification and trust services. eIDAS compliance ensures that digital credentials issued through TRUE carry appropriate legal weight within the European regulatory framework.
For universities, TRUE seals diplomas through Mandated Issue: the institution stays the named issuer and TRUE applies the seal on its behalf, so the institution needs no eSeal of its own. Opened in the European Commission's own Europass viewer, a TRUE-sealed credential comes back verified. The details are in eIDAS-sealed university diplomas, and blockchain timestamps and eIDAS explains how the anchor and the seal fit together.
A public-sector document suits blockchain when someone outside the issuing body has to trust it, often years after issue. Those documents include:
"Amazing. I tip my hat for your design TRUE! It was really fun to be able to give Blockchain-secured diplomas to the winners of HACK FOR SÖDERTÄLJE." Anthony Mccarrick, Digitization Strategist, Södertälje Kommun
The common thread is a counterparty who cannot see inside the agency's database and has no time to call. A TRUE document answers that counterparty directly, on the agency's own domain.
A public body should look for documents that anyone can check without an account, data kept under a jurisdiction it can defend in procurement, and issuing that connects to the systems the agency already runs. TRUE Original is built on those requirements. Other credential platforms focus on corporate training badges. TRUE is built for high-value credentials where security, compliance, and permanence matter.
The fingerprint of every TRUE document sits on a public blockchain, not on TRUE's servers. A credential issued today remains verifiable in 10, 20, or 50 years, regardless of what happens to any single system or organization.
Blockchain reduces administration in government services by moving verification from agency staff to the person who needs the answer. A citizen shows a TRUE document, the counterparty checks it in seconds, and no case officer is involved.
Digital documents also remove printing, postage and physical archives. Issuing runs from the systems the agency already has, through the API or in batches, so a licence renewal or a completed training produces its document without anyone typing a name. Every TRUE document carries a timestamp and a blockchain transaction, which gives auditors a record that was never edited after the fact.
A public body starts with one document type, proves it in a pilot and then widens the scope, the way Bolagsverket went from a concept built in eight weeks to a government mandate covering licences, trademark certificates and company registrations. Public procurement takes time, and TRUE supports agencies through evaluation, pilot and full deployment.
Book a demo and TRUE will walk through security, compliance and integration for your agency's own documents. Bolagsverket's first phase took eight weeks.
Governments use blockchain to make public records tamper-evident and checkable by anyone. The European Commission lists notarisation, diplomas, European digital identity and trusted data sharing between authorities as the first EBSI use cases, and in Sweden Bolagsverket built Proof of Business with TRUE Original in eight weeks.
EBSI, the European Blockchain Services Infrastructure, is a peer-to-peer blockchain network for public services in which each member of the European Blockchain Partnership (the 27 EU countries, Norway, Liechtenstein and the European Commission) will run at least one node. The partnership was launched in 2018 to develop and deploy it.
Blockchain digital credentials are diplomas, licences, certificates and memberships whose fingerprint is anchored on a public blockchain, so anyone can confirm they have not changed since issue. TRUE Original has issued over 900,000 such documents, anchored on several public blockchains, among them Ethereum and Polygon.
Verification compares the document with the fingerprint written to the blockchain at issue; if they match, the document is unchanged. Anyone can check a TRUE Original document by opening its link or QR code, or in TRUE Verify, free and without an account.
Bolagsverket, the Swedish Companies Registration Office, built Proof of Business with TRUE Original in eight weeks: official business documents as secure digital records that anyone can verify. Bolagsverket then received a government mandate to investigate a second phase covering licences, trademark certificates and company registrations.
Yes. TRUE Value Software AB has held its own eIDAS Qualified Electronic Seal certificate since May 2026, so a TRUE Original diploma can carry a qualified seal recognised in all 27 EU member states as well as a blockchain anchor.
Only when personal data is written to the chain, because an entry on a public blockchain cannot be deleted. TRUE Original writes only a fingerprint of each document to the blockchain, and no personal data is stored on the blockchain itself.
Yes, mostly at state and county level. According to the Brookings Institution in June 2025, California's Department of Motor Vehicles has used blockchain to digitise 42 million car titles, and at least 19 states have set up official study groups on the technology.
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