Everyone knows that Blockchain is a digitized, public ledger that contains all of the cryptocurrency transactions. It is decentralized and allows participants to keep track of the transactions without any central authority. This is the gist of Blockchain. There are two types of Blockchain: Private and Public. Some may ask what’s the difference between the two? This blog post will help you get a clearer idea of the Private and Public blockchain.
As the name suggests, public blockchain is completely open to everyone who wishes to join and participate in the network. By entering the network, users can benefit from the incentivizing mechanism that allows them to refer and earn rewards for encouraging other people to join the network. The said blockchain is decentralized and immutable so that no one can attempt to change the data during transactions.
However, public blockchain has its share of cons. The amount of computational power is massive to maintain the ledger at a larger scale. Each node in the network must solve a complex cryptographic problem to mine the transaction, and every resource must be in sync. This will not be possible as the network grows. Bitcoin and Ethereum are standing examples of the public blockchain.
A private blockchain is also called as the permissioned network that works similarly to the public blockchain, but users must gain an invitation and get or be validated by the pre-set rules of the network precursor. Participants must obtain an invitation or permission to join the network and then get validated before they could do anything. The access control mechanism will decide the access entry of the participant who has joined the network. It is used widely by enterprises that require only selected users to use the blockchain.
But the con in private blockchain is the use of regulatory authority that issues the licenses or makes the decision on behalf of the network. This will ensure that all nodes play their role in the network. The Linux Foundation’s Hyperledger Fabric is an example of permissioned blockchain framework.
An analogy between Public and Private Blockchain
Despite varying differences, both public and private blockchain has its set of similarities.
- Both are a decentralized peer-to-peer network, where the user can maintain a replica of the transactions or the whole ledger. Permissioned blockchain uses regulatory authority only to a certain level.
- Both blockchains contain a consensus protocol to maintain the resources and transactions in sync. Permissioned blockchain executes this more than its counterpart.
- They both provide immutability of the ledger to a certain extent.
A question may arise while reading this blog, Is it essential to have distinct blockchain? The answer is yes. Both blockchains have a lot of developing to do with technological, privacy and scalability issues. Blockchain App Factory, a pioneer in the field of blockchain development pledges to create both private and public blockchain with all the needed features and customization affiliated with it.