What is AnyLog?
AnyLog is a public network of computers providing a “Decentralized loT Network” where Data Owners manage loT data – AnyLog is leveraging a decentralized network and the blockchain technology to replace complex back-end databases with automated, p2p and real-time processes to manage the IoT data. AnyLog creates a new ecosystem and marketplaces to collect, store, process, analyze and monetize IoT data. In this ecosystem, data owners leverage the network to manage their data and operators are incentivized to provide compute resources to the network.
What is the main usage of the AnyLog Network
For data owners – The AnyLog Network removes the complexity and reduces the costs of managing IoT data.
Recent studies show that most IoT projects fail because of complexity (Cisco say 75% of IoT projects fail). AnyLog simplifies and automates the treatment of the data and makes it available to enterprise applications in real-time with minimal effort. In addition, AnyLog unifies the treatment of the data at the edge and the cloud making edge and cloud projects redundant – Data owners only need to send the data to the operators of their choice and all the rest is automated.
For operators – The AnyLog Network allows operators to monetize their resources with no investment in software infrastructure and marketing costs.
Is the goal of AnyLog to create a marketplace for data?
A marketplace for data is a longer-term outcome. The immediate reason to use the AnyLog Network is for data owners to service their data efficiently, at a low cost, and for operators to monetize their data.
As a marketplace, data owners provide permissions to users that are interested to query their data, in return for rewards.
Since the AnyLog Network provides strong incentives for data owners to use the network to manage their data, over time, the network will represent large portions of the IoT data. As the network provides a unified interface to the data (SQL based interface), anyone with permissions to the data can integrate the network to his applications. This functionality will motivate data owners to provide access to their data in return for rewards.
Who are the operators that store my data?
As an Enterprise you will initially store your data with a trusted Operator. This would be your own data center, a trusted cloud provider, a data center that you trust or a combination of the above. This is done by running the AnyLog operator code (open source) on the trusted machines. With this setup, devices transfer the data directly to the trusted machines and your applications can interact with the data as if the data is on a local database.
This approach eliminates the need to manage most of the backend databases and processes (at the edge and the cloud).
Over time, with the AnyLog offered access and security controls (as well as penalties to operators that diverge from SLA contracts), and depending on the type of data being managed, Enterprises can choose less trusted operators and further reduce the costs.
By allowing data owners to select operators, and as the AnyLog software is unified across all the service providers (and therefore there is no lockup), enterprises can optimize the service providers based on their needs.
Is the IoT data placed on the blockchain?
No, the IoT data if off chain. Operators maintain the data using the AnyLog software (open source) on their machines. AnyLog is using the blockchain to manage the contracts that detail the SLA, register the payments channels and some of the metadata. This architecture allows to interact with the data in real-time, to significantly reduce scalability limits and is not bounded by the blockchain inclusion latency.
What is the purpose of the blockchain in AnyLog network?
To achieve an architecture that is fully decentralized – the blockchain is a highly-available, decentralized mechanism for coordinating registrations, processing payments, and (when desired) mediating SLA disputes.
How do you guarantee that operators are available and honest?
AnyLog is using multiple layers of guarantees:
a) Data owners select trusted operators (such as their own data centers or trusted cloud providers and data centers).
b) Providing availability by placing the data on multiple independent machines and protecting the data using access authorization and data protection mechanisms (such as encryption and distributing the encryption keys only to authorized users). If data is stored on untrusted machines, the Network protocol validates correctness of the returned results.
c) Operators provide security deposits and contracts for data storage include penalties that are triggered if operators are not responsive or operate maliciously.
Who owns my data?
Data Owners maintain full control of their data and own their data. Very much like a centralized database, AnyLog employs access control and encryption mechanisms that protect the data and provide access to authorized users, and very much like a cloud provider, the data storage is based on a contract between the data owner and the operator that service the data.
Are you serious about hosting the entire loT data sets?
Yes. AnyLog is based on p2p processes where devices deliver data to Service Providers and queries are executed to process data maintained by the Service Providers. This approach eliminates contention between devices that generate data, centralized databases and query processes, and is very scalable. When a device transfers data to a service provider, a different device transfers different data to a different provider without dependency on the first device. Queries operate in the same way – when a query is executed, there is no contention with a different query. We believe that the network will rapidly increase in use as it creates strong incentives for Data Owners and Service Providers to participate. As more data needs to be serviced, more Service Providers would be interested to participate. Incentives are in the form of token rewards, that are provided to Service Providers in exchange for their resources. As the price is determined in a bidding process, the rewards will incentivize the Service Providers to provide the needed resources and it will incentivize the Data Owners as service price will be low. We believe that this approach will bring a big portion of the IoT data to the AnyLog Network.
Are the AnyLog technical white papers available?
We plan to release the white papers in Q2 of 2020. However, we can share the white papers to identified individuals under a NDA. If you are interested in the technical papers please contact us using this form
What is the business model of AnyLog?
AnyLog is building a non-for-profit organization. The reason is that a for-profit requires premiums on top of transactions and therefore a centralized approach. As the ability to scale is tightly coupled with decentralization, we believe that only a non-for-profit organization will be able to deliver the value of the AnyLog network. In this model, transactions would use the AnyLog token, and our investors believe that the value of the network would be represented in the appreciation of the token.
How can I meet the AnyLog people in person?
We are located in the Silicon Valley, we frequently participate in loT and blockchain conferences – the conference list is available here. Or email us using this form.