A distributed ledger (also called shared ledger) is a consensus of replicated, shared, and synchronized digital data geographically spread across multiple sites, countries, or institutions. There is no central administrator or centralised data storage.
A peer-to-peer network is required as well as consensus algorithms to ensure replication across nodes is undertaken. One distributed ledger design is through implementation of a public or private blockchain system. But all distributed ledgers do not have to necessarily employ a chain of blocks to successfully provide secure and valid achievement of distributed consensus, a Blockchain is only one type of data structure considered to be a distributed ledger.
In 2016, numerous banks trialed distributed ledgers for international payments.
Applications
Incumbent banks are investing heavily in distributed ledgers as a cost-saving measure and a way to reduce operational risks. The future use of distributed ledgers is expected to monetize the Internet of Things in a programmable economy.
Everledger is used to track diamonds by recording numerous unique data points.