Israel Securities Authority Now Using Blockchain Technology

Yael and Etsba-on

The integration has been executed in two stages. The first was with a system called ‘Yael‘, which the authority uses to communicate with its supervised entities.

The authority says that blockchain will add reliability when transmitting information to its charges because it confirms the origin of the messages and prevents forgery and deletion. An additional benefit is that nobody can deny that they have received a message.

The next stage, as yet not completed, involves the authority’s ‘Etsba-on‘ voting system. This is used to allow investors to participate in meetings regardless of their physical location.

The ISA also plans to implement blockchain technology into its monitoring system.

According to the announcement, the development of this system took three months and was executed by Taldor, an IT company.

Natan Hershkovitz, the ISA’s Head of Information Systems, said: “We are seeing a growing trend in the world in general and in the financial sector in particular of implementing innovative and groundbreaking technology. The application of blockchain technology into the information systems of the ISA makes it one of the world’s leading authorities in terms of the security and reliability of information that it passes to the public.”

How times have changed

The regulatory authority has come a long way since January 2018 when it proposed the temporary expulsion of all cryptocurrency firms from the national stock exchange. This may be due to its change in leadership – Anat Guetta took over from Professor Shmuel Hauser that same month. Hauser had been suspicious of the new industry.

Guetta soon sent a signal that she is more receptive to cryptocurrency by proposing a national sandbox for approved initial coin offerings in March. That same month, the authority published the conclusions reached by a committee regarding the legal definition of cryptocurrency, specifically, that tokens are securities and coins are not.