Arkly is a professional digital archives management service for decentralized platforms. It provides permanent document storage to blockchain applications that need persistent links to immutable off-chain files. This is a critical but often over-looked web3 component to provide context and provenance to blockchain-based verification proofs.
All layer 1 blockchains like Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Cardano have very small and restrictive block sizes to maximize the performance of their computing functions. Every new block in their chain must be rapidly distributed to all their mining or validator nodes. All blockchains would grind to a halt if users were able to stuff them full of JPGs, PDFs, and MP4s.
However, Web3 users do expect blockchain applications to provide "trustless" data verification services. Developers address this need by generating checksum hashes for the digital files that they want to associate with their blockchain transactions. If they have designed their system well, then hashes for these off-chain files can be used to retrieve them from some online location.
Arkly is a premium Web3 service to perform this function. It implements the long-standing principle of the "archival bond" to inextricably link off-chain files to immutable on-chain transactions. It complies with ISO standards for record-keeping to protect the authenticity and long-term accessibility of the files it manages.
Arkly leverages the Arweave decentralized storage network to provide additional veracity proofs along with permanent on-line access. These are guaranteed by one-time storage endowment fees that don't rely on a trusted service provider or system administrator to perpetually monitor storage contract renewals.
Who is building Arkly?
Arkly is currently in a research and development phase. It is being integrated as the archival storage component of the Landano and Orcfax Web3 projects. The Arkly R&D is being led by Peter Van Garderen, founder of the widely-deployed, free and open-source institutional archives management systems Archivematica and AccessToMemory.
When Arkly?
We plan to open access to the Arkly API for other Web3 projects in 2025. We will also launch a user-interface later that year.