This archive report was first published on 17 September 2019.
As we approach the twenty-first century, it's astonishing that the way universities issue certificates remains stuck in the analogue age.
Manual certificates, signed by the vice chancellor and academic registrar, and sealed with a university stamp, can be easily replicated by counterfeiters.
Several certificate printing mills have been busted in Nairobi's River Road, but their ability to mimic degrees from renowned universities persists.
A prospective employer would struggle to distinguish between a genuine PhD certificate from Oxford University and a fake one from a River Road mill.
However, verifying a certificate's authenticity through Oxford University in the UK is a time-consuming process, involving data protection procedures.
Blockchain technology offers a more efficient solution, providing an immutable digital infrastructure to record events of interest.
By hosting educational transcripts and certificates on a blockchain, the Commission of Higher Education (CUE) can play a leading role in a private blockchain system.
Universities would form a consortium, each running a local node or server, issued with credentials from CUE to participate in the blockchain.
Using these digital credentials, universities can issue digital identities to graduates, writing their academic details onto the private blockchain.
When a graduate meets a prospective employer, they can share their digital identity, providing consent for the employer to access and verify their credentials online.
Universities can even earn revenue from verification queries, making the system more sustainable.
By implementing a digital certificate issuance system, we can wipe out the River Road printing mills and ensure the authenticity of academic credentials.
It's high time we redesigned our certificate issuance system across all levels of learning.
