Microsoft Office Software to Get Bitcoin Blockchain Authentication Upgrade

Golden Finance News - According to the latest news, Microsoft Office users can now create immutable documents with the help of the Bitcoin blockchain. On April 10, a block-based document authentication and verification application called Stampery was added to the multinational technology giant’s Microsoft Office program.

Office users will be able to create immutable documents with the help of the Bitcoin blockchain Image source: Golden Finance

Microsoft Office add-on is Bitcoin blockchain-authenticated

Microsoft has been showing support for Bitcoin blockchain-related applications for quite some time. Now, a company engineer, Ville Rantala, has announced the launch of a Stampery block add-on for the Microsoft Office suite. Users can basically use the Bitcoin blockchain or Ethereum blockchain to prove and verify documents. Microsoft engineers believe that organizations and individuals need to record and protect important documents every day. Rantala's details focus more on the inviolable authentication and verification aspects, providing crucial help for the integrity of legal documents and contracts that cannot be manipulated.

Ville Rantala launches Stampery add-on for Microsoft Office suite Image source: Golden Finance

Creating a hash of a document begins to replace “relying on a single entity (business, public, government, etc.) to maintain proof of identity and send that hash to a publicly accessible entity like the Bitcoin blockchain,”

Rantala, a senior engineer at Microsoft, explained: “Once the hashed data exists on the public blockchain of the Bitcoin blockchain, people cannot change the document and invalidate the hash. This approach guarantees the privacy of the document and the usability of the data without further data verification.”

Bitcoin blockchain authentication and verification without leaving the office process

Microsoft's Rantala said they leveraged a secure API to bring the Stampery add-in into Microsoft Office and Outlook without leaving the program. This means that add-in authentication and verification buttons can be found in the software toolbar. The engineer's blog post details how the process works in the platform's user interface;

API brings Stampery add-ins to Microsoft Office and Outlook Image source: Golden Finance

Authentication: Pressing the Authentication button will call a JavaScript function in Office. This function will hash the document and send the sha256 hash to the Node.js server as a REST call, so the document never leaves Office. The Node.js server runs as an Azure App Service and keeps a copy of the hash for later verification, and then calls the Stampery API with the hash function. The Stampery service will put the hash into the public Ethereum and Bitcoin blockchains.

Verify: Pressing the Verify button again calls the Javascript function from the authentication process which sends the hash table file to the Node.js server as a REST call. The Node.js server then calls the Stampery API to access the original hash of the document from both blockchains.

Notarization solutions for individual and corporate clients

Rantala believes that by adding Stampery to the Office platform, users will be able to adopt a more secure method of document storage with the help of the Bitcoin blockchain. In addition, the engineers of the technology company believe that corporate customers will find this feature very useful because this application can ensure the validity of important business documents. Created in 1988, Microsoft Office is one of the most popular word processing software suites in office and business environments around the world.

The code for the Stampery Office add-in is open source and the license is available on Github.

“Users can see that the document sent to them has been signed or stamped, and then it has been verified or notarized,” Rantala explained.