Ethereum
BFA is based on Ethereum, one of the most popular public blockchains internationally. The Ethereum mainnet is a decentralized platform that works under Proof of Work and allows any developer to create and publish distributed applications and execute smart contracts on the blockchain. Blockchain Federal Argentina uses the Ethereum software, but discards the Proof of Work model, opting for a consensus based on Proof of Authority.
As this is an open source technology, the whole community can participate in the existing developments and proof of concepts to improve the platform, or take all that work and adapt it to other contexts and needs.
Monitoring
In BFA, each organization that deploys a sealer node is responsible of monitoring its status. There is no central administration system in the network.
But, as a backup of that scheme, the organization maintains a NOC (Network Operation Center) that monitors the health of the core of the network. The NOC does not have a single centralized location, it’s distributed geographically and between various parties of BFA.
Time Stamp
There are ways to certify content through Blockchain. These mechanisms allow us to generate a "proof of existence", something like a digital stamp that shows that a content existed before a certain date and time. BFA offers its own time stamping service, which gives proof that a certain digital file has remained unchanged in time from a certain date.
More information:
Ether Distillery
To send transactions to the blockchain a "gas" is needed, that takes the form of virtual tokens called Ether, which BFA distributes to all the users of the platform.
In Blockchain Federal Argentina the Ether does not have any economic value, and is sent without any kind of associated cost through a space operated by the organization called the Distillery. In this model every kind of speculation or exchange of tokens is avoided: there's no need to buy or sell Ether, because is free. Also, the Distillery enables methods to detect abuse and protect the network.
At the same time, to reaffirm the transparency of BFA, any read-only node that is integrated to the network will be able to verify the fidelity of the information without the need of Ether.
