SAE AIR7123

The scope of this document is to provide an overview, process, and implementation guidance on use of blockchain technology for a secure, immutable, and traceable digital authorized release certificate. This document does not standardize the process nor is it meant for authorities to recognize the standard as an acceptable means of recording data collected through the required authorized release certificate (ARC) tags. Digital transactions are not new but are now being recorded differently. For instance, blockchain is one of those means of recording digital transactions and is not well understood outside of a few communities. Every part in the supply chain, from a small switch to a whole aircraft, needs to have a certificate, but in many cases, it is still a paper certificate. A digital authorized release certificate (DARC) will help enormously to achieve higher efficiency in the aviation industry. The ATA e-Business program has created an XML standard for electronic transactions of these certificates (refer to ATA Spec 2000 [Ch. 16]), and a separate group has created DIN SPEC 9012. In addition, many paper documents are digitized by scanning to a PDF standard in which the information is electronic, but specific data fields are not necessarily machine-readable. This document will provide an overview, process, and implementation guidance on the use of blockchain technology to better secure the immutability and traceability of a DARC. This SAE Aerospace Information Report (AIR) presents an overview of blockchain-enabled DARC and its viability to make it interoperable, transferable, verifiable, traceable, secure, and immutable. The scope of this document is to provide information on DARCs and does not standardize the process to capture information. It is not meant for regulatory authorities to recognize this standard as an acceptable means of recording data collected via the required authorized release certificate (ARC) tags (refer to FAA Form 8130-3 and EASA Form 1) but rather could inform those regulatory bodies about considerations for using such data in a blockchain or similar environment.