In 2016, the startup Blockchain Partner took the initiative to support the Banque de France in providing technical leverage for the MADRE project, in particular by mastering experimentation. In 2018, the project was awarded the innovation prize. Its aim is to facilitate the management of SEPA identifiers through a private “blockchain”. Today, in 2019, the Banque de France is going into production. Franck Peltier and I will discuss the main features of this project with you.
Understanding the MADRE project
MADRE is a project that consists in decentralizing the Sepa creditor identifier register (ICS register). Previously, this register was managed and centralised by the Banque de France.
Now, with the creation of a private blockchain, it is now possible for the different banks to manage this register in an automatic way. This is as advantageous for the Banque de France as for the banks concerned, particularly in terms of time reduction, cost savings and automation of the process.
According to Franck Peltier, we are therefore talking about the first blockchain project launched by the Banque de France and the very first project put into production by a central bank.
The case of the Banque de France
The MADRE project has been realized using an Ethereum fork (decentralized exchange protocol) which means that it uses the same Nakamoto consensus as Bitcoin. The privatization of this “blockchain” also implies that few users are allowed to own and operate the network nodes. This means that without permission, these users will not be able to manage the registry.
In addition, each bank will have a node that will operate under its responsibility. However, since users are sworn in by the Banque de France, the latter has the right to monitor the entities concerned that use the application and to revoke their privileges as well.
For Franck Peltier, the distribution of the nodes in several geographical locations allows users to keep a copy of the data on another physical server, to be used in the event of a problem: power failure, flood, fire, etc.
This method is also recommended for critical data, such as banking data. This is why when we often talk about decentralization we say “No single point of failure”, because in this type of systems there is not only one point of failure.
It should also be added that the MADRE project is decentralized in two senses, namely the computer sense and the sense of entity in control. This can be explained as follows:
The servers are multiple and are located in different places (knowing that the “blockchains” are created by human beings who can still make mistakes), which requires a great deal of coordination during updates, especially critical ones such as security patches.
