BMW Presents Blockchain-Based Odometer Fraud Prevention App VerifyCar Developed With VeChain

Cihan Albay, IT leader at BMW Group Asia's Tech Office in Singapore, presented the tool to summit attendees. Odometer tampering affects a third of used cars sold in Germany—33 percent of the market—and costs the country about 6 billion euros each year, or 3,000 euros per vehicle.

"What we tried to do here is to build a digital passport that verifies datasets and allows people to know if what a seller says is really true," Albay said. "We built a digital ledger using the VeChain blockchain. Every interaction with a car has a stored hash key in the blockchain. That can be anything from changing a filter, changing the battery, having the annual service, etc. Our cars all have a SIM card which sends out datasets regularly. We store these datasets, verify them and of course make a call to the blockchain to prove that this call has already been made."

The company tested VerifyCar on its own vehicles. BMW is determining how to roll the product out. "Blockchain is still a sensitive topic. People in Germany currently don't know how to react about blockchain, especially when they hear that information stored on a blockchain cannot be deleted afterwards," Albay said. "We really need to have a look at our business strategy and how to roll out. But we have proven that it works and we are keen to continue further."

VeChain joined BMW through its Startup Garage program, a four-month incubation initiative focused on developing solutions for the automaker. The two companies have been working together for more than a year. VerifyCar is one of several blockchain projects BMW has undertaken. The automaker founded the Mobility Open Blockchain Initiative last year with more than 30 partners. That consortium counts more than 100 companies and organizations. BMW has collaborated with blockchain startups Bloom, Dovu, and Supermoney as well.