Blockchain has been described as the biggest innovation since the Internet.

The underlying Distributed Ledger Technology (“DLT”) allows for synchronised exchanges of information to take place across networks through consensually shared, decentralised databases. This allows the creation and alteration of information to be witnessed, recorded, and verified from all nodes simultaneously, increasing efficiency and mitigating cyberattacks and fraud.

While most commonly associated with Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, DLT presents a multitude of other applications that have begun to reshape major industries, such as music, finance, transport, and healthcare. Malta has embraced this technology and enacted comprehensive legislation to assist in the regulation of this new field in a manner which provides legal certainty, but which encourages innovation. This comes chiefly in the form of 3 acts, namely the Malta Digital Innovation Authority Act, the Innovative Technology Arrangements and Services Act, and the Virtual Financial Assets Act. With each development, Malta further lives up to its name of ‘the Blockchain Island’.

As blockchain is still in its nascence, its continual evolution in legal and other aspects will pose an array of challenges for businesses using the technology, their suppliers, and for customers. sammut.legal offers strategic guidance and creative solutions for Blockchain and DLT, and is already working with a number of companies working in this dynamic field