Apple&rsquo;s App Transport Security (or simply ATS) is a networking security feature that forces an app to use an HTTPS web services connection instead of an HTTP. Apple added ATS as an optional feature with the introduction of iOS9 in 2015: developers were still allowed to switch it off. However, at WWDC 2016 Apple <a href="https://techcrunch.com/2016/06/14/apple-will-require-https-connections-for-ios-apps-by-the-end-of-2016/">announced</a> that starting from 2017 the feature will be mandatory for all apps submitted to App Store.
In this article, we are going to speak a little more about the App Transportation Security feature, its role in&nbsp;<a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/technology/mobile-development">iOS app development</a>, and learn how to add Domain Exceptions considering the new ATS requirements.
<h3>A bit more about ATS and its requirements</h3>
App Transport Security is basically a set of rules that ensure iOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS apps and app extensions connect to web services they work with using secure connection protocols. This improves users&rsquo; privacy and integrity of their data and safeguards it from various malicious parties.
By configuring the NSAppTransportSecurity key&rsquo;s value in your app&rsquo;s Info.plist file, <a href="https://developer.apple.com/library/archive/documentation/General/Reference/InfoPlistKeyReference/Articles/CocoaKeys.html">you can configure</a> your network connections&rsquo; security in a different of ways.&nbsp;
You can:
<ul>
<li>add exceptions for insecure communication with particular servers;</li>
<li>disable ATS protection for web views or media, while still using the feature to protect other data in your app;</li>
<li>enable Certificate Transparency and other new security features.&nbsp;</li>
</ul>
Currently, ATS requires your app to connect to servers that:
<ul>
<li>support the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol version 1.2 or later;</li>
<li>use AES-128 encryption standard and SHA-2-signed certificates;</li>
<li>provide Forward Secrecy protocols.</li>
</ul>
However, since Forward Secrecy protocols aren&rsquo;t used by the majority of servers yet, Apple can accept this as a reasonable justification for including ATS in your app even if the servers it connects with doesn't provide Forward Secrecy.
Among other reasons that can justify including ATS in your app without meeting all requirements are:
<ul>
<li>the server is not fully ATS compatible;</li>
<li>you use a third-party service or SDK that does not support ATS at the moment;</li>
<li>you don&rsquo;t have the time or the resources to add the required functionality yet.</li>
</ul>
However, these exceptions are temporary: Apple just gives developers some time to get ready to use ATS as a mandatory with future updates. And the first requirements update is coming real soon.
<h3>The new requirements&nbsp;</h3>
Since January 1, 2017, the ATS feature will be mandatory for all apps on App Store and for the servers they connect with. If you don&rsquo;t want your app to be rejected from App Store, you must turn on and configure ATS according to the new requirements.
Here are three cases when an exempted ATS will lead to an app rejection from app store:
<ul>
<li>NSAllowsArbitraryLoads, which disables ATS for all domains. ATS can be re-enabled for specific domains by using an exception domain dictionary.</li>
<li>NSExceptionAllowsInsecureHTTPLoads, which disables ATS for a single domain, to allow insecure HTTP loads to that domain.</li>
<li>NSExceptionMinimumTLSVersion, which enables support for TLS versions that are older than 1.2 for a specific domain.</li>
</ul>
Other ATS exemptions such as, for example, NSExceptionRequiresForwardSecrecy can be enabled and won&rsquo;t trigger an App Store rejection.
However, the three blacklisted exemptions mentioned above can lead to rejection only in case the servers an app connects to are under the developer&rsquo;s control. For third-party servers, on the other hand, all ATS exemptions can be used: according to Apple, using a server you don&rsquo;t have control over is a reasonable excuse for developers to use the exemptions.
To do this, you will need to identify all third-party servers your app connects to and to add the ATS exemptions specific to the domains.
<h3>Why Apple now enforces ATS</h3>
Unlike web browsers that designate the type (HTTP or HTTPS) of connection they use, mobile apps don&rsquo;t let users know whether they use regular or secure web connection.&nbsp;
The initial implementation of ATS as an optional feature was surely only the first step towards increasing mobile app&rsquo;s security. Now as app developers got to know the new networking security feature, Apple takes one more step closer to ensuring secure web connection within their products.
<h3>How to add&nbsp;Domain Exceptions</h3>
Here&rsquo;s what you do to add a third-party domain as an exception for your ATS.
Add the NSExceptionDomains key to the NSAppTransportSecurity dictionary of your app&rsquo;s Info.plist&nbsp;file. The key&rsquo;s value is a dictionary which contains keys describing domain exceptions:
<pre><code class="language-xml">&lt;key&gt;NSAppTransportSecurity&lt;/key&gt;
&lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSAllowsArbitraryLoads&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;false/&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSExceptionDomains&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;agilie.com&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSIncludesSubdomains&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;true/&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSExceptionAllowsInsecureHTTPLoads&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;true/&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;/dict&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;/dict&gt;
&lt;/dict&gt;</code></pre>
Here, we enable ATS and set a domain exception for agilie.com. The NSIncludesSubdomains key means we include all subdomains of this domain as exceptions, too. The NSExceptionAllowsInsecureHTTPLoads key allows the non-HTTPS requests for the domain and its subdomains. &nbsp;
Setting the value of the NSAllowsArbitraryLoads key to true applies the ATS rules to the domain and subdomains, while they will remain exceptions.
You can also add multiple domain exceptions at a time and apply the exceptions not only to the HTTPS protocol network requests but also to the configuration of the server your app connects to.
Here&rsquo;s an example:
<pre><code class="language-xml">&lt;key&gt;NSAppTransportSecurity&lt;/key&gt;
&lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSAllowsArbitraryLoads&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;false/&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSExceptionDomains&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;anotherdomain.com&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSIncludesSubdomains&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;true/&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSExceptionMinimumTLSVersion&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;string&gt;TLSv1.0&lt;/string&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;/dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;onemoredomain.com&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSExceptionRequiresForwardSecrecy&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;false/&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;/dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;agilie.com&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;dict&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSIncludesSubdomains&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;true/&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;key&gt;NSExceptionAllowsInsecureHTTPLoads&lt;/key&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;true/&gt;
&nbsp; &nbsp; &lt;/dict&gt;
&nbsp; &lt;/dict&gt;
&lt;/dict&gt;</code></pre>
Now you know how to add domain exceptions. But will it be possible with the further ATS updates? Let&rsquo;s sum up what we know to expect so far.
<h3>The future of ATS</h3>
While the NSExceptionRequiresForwardSecrecy key won&rsquo;t lead to app rejection from App Store, this will probably change with the future ATS requirements updates. This is likely to happen as soon as more servers will provide the Forward Secrecy protocols.
Some hints were given during Apple&rsquo;s <a href="https://developer.apple.com/videos/wwdc2016">What&rsquo;s New in Security</a> presentation at WWDC 2016. Here&rsquo;s what you as an iOS developer should take into account next year:
<ul>
<li>The SHA-1-signed certificates won&rsquo;t be used since they are to be blocked by Google.</li>
<li>The 3DES TLS cipher suites are better&nbsp;to be disabled since they&rsquo;re only needed for the compatibility with the obsolete Windows XP.</li>
<li>You should start deploying the Certificate Transparency and OCSP Stapling (aka TLS Certificate Status Request) technologies to your app servers.</li>
</ul>
Luckily, Apple understands that it&rsquo;s impossible to cut all insecure connections at a time, and they are ready to make exceptions for those who can&rsquo;t meet all the requirements.
But don&rsquo;t rely on these exceptions heavily - their main purpose is to get you ready to use ATS as a mandatory feature in the nearest future. Apple wants you to provide greater security to your app and to people who use it, so complying with the new ATS requirements will help you build trust with your users and - ultimately - provide better services.

In this article, we'll speak&nbsp;about Apple's App Transportation Security feature and highlight its importance for mobile app development.

Apple's App Transportation Security feature, its importance for mobile app development, and learn how to add Domain Exceptions considering the new ATS requirements that will be introduced in 2017.

How to Add Domain Exceptions to Comply with Apple's New ATS Requirements 

In our <a href="https://agilie.com/blog/what-type-of-restaurant-app-is-best-for-your-business">previous article</a> devoted to restaurant app development, we highlighted two types of restaurant apps on the market: 1) restaurant discovery and booking platforms, and 2) branded standalone restaurant apps. We wrote about some successful products out there and made our points in favor of both types of apps.
Now, we&rsquo;re going to outline all major benefits mobile apps for restaurant owners can provide. There are lots of them, so we decided to accumulate these benefits into the seven most important things that will help you enhance your services as you decided to go mobile.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">1. Fast and easy customer experience</h2>
A mobile app helps restaurant owners establish a fast and convenient customer experience, which means reduced wait time and increased sales.
Table booking is the first feature that comes to mind when you&rsquo;re thinking about a restaurant app. However, as we stated in the earlier article, it&rsquo;s not the best strategy to focus on table reservations only. First, they don&rsquo;t guarantee any ROI for restaurant owners. Second, for big and crowded restaurants or chains online bookings, if not organized right, can lead to a real logistical hell at the restaurant. In a case when a restaurant often has free tables, booking feature is simply unnecessary.
Meal ordering is a more valuable feature, that, unfortunately, is less utilized by restaurant app developers. However, allowing app users to choose and order their meals in advance, thus significantly reducing visitor&rsquo;s wait time, will help not only establish better customer experience at your restaurant but also make the staff&rsquo;s work easier and faster.
You can add even more value to this feature by letting app users browse their order history and store their favorite orders. This will make the ordering process even faster and convenient.
<img style="width: 800px; height: 464px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/220/content_panera_roll.jpg" alt="Panera food ordering app" />
<a href="https://www.panerabread.com/en-us/home.html">Panera Bread</a> - one of the most popular apps focused on meal ordering functionality
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">2. Expand your target audience with active mobile users</h2>
As the <a href="https://www.adweek.com/performance-marketing/survey-25-of-users-have-at-least-one-restaurant-app-on-their-phone/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">latest surveys suggest</a>, people - especially those between the ages of 25 and 34 - tend to use mobile apps to discover restaurants and make reservations. Furthermore, 25% of respondents have at least one restaurant app installed on their device.
Catching up with this trend will not only make restaurant&rsquo;s services better for the existing customer base but also appeal to young people who seek for a good restaurant mobile service. Finally, to retain this audience you&rsquo;ll need to ensure three things: the app, the restaurant services, and the food.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">3. Better discovery</h2>
And by discovery, we mean all possible ways a mobile app can make a restaurant more visible to the customers. <a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/technology/mobile-development">Mobile technologies</a> help deliver the information on a restaurant location, menu and establish an emotional connection with customers by memorable restaurant app design.
The most obvious thing here is discovering a restaurant's location with the help of mapping services. This feature is a must for restaurant and food discovery apps like OpenTable and Urbanspoon, as well as for large chains&rsquo; branded apps.
But people need to know not only the restaurant&rsquo;s location. They also need to know what does the restaurant have to offer. A mobile app solves this by providing customers with easy menu access. The menu is more appealing when the meals are illustrated with appealing photos. Just note that the reality must correspond to what people see in the app and vice versa.
In the same fashion, restaurant owners can show off their places providing alluring interior photos or even 3D tours to the restaurants.
Nice photos aside, a thoughtful restaurant <a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/technology/ui-ux-design">app design</a> helps establish a visual communication between restaurant owners and customers, make both an app and a restaurant distinctive and build brand awareness.
Adding social sharing features can help extend the brand awareness to users&rsquo; friends and followers on social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. You can reinforce this feature rewarding users with loyalty points for each share. (We&rsquo;ll touch upon loyalty programs later in the article).
<img style="width: 800px; height: 486px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/221/content_coast_roll.jpg" alt="coast restaurant app" />
Agilie&rsquo;s <a href="online-food-ordering-systems-how-to-create-a-restaurant-online-ordering-website">Coast</a> restaurant app was among the first on the local market to provide social sharing and 3D-tour features
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">4. Retain users more effectively</h2>
Mobile apps' landscape knows a variety of successful approaches to retaining users. &nbsp;Among such features that restaurant mobile app developers can adopt are loyalty programs and user notifications.
Loyalty programs. Both table booking services and restaurant apps retain their users mostly thanks to loyalty programs with discounts and rewards. Gift cards and coupons are things customers tend to lose so stubbornly, and mobile loyalty programs are the best solution to this problem so far.
In our previous article, we mentioned the case of Starbucks&rsquo; app which, thanks to gamification elements and transparent reward system, got a significant rise in user base right after the introduction of the new loyalty program.
<img style="width: 800px; height: 480px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/222/content_starbucks_roll.jpg" alt="Starbucks reward system" />
<a href="https://www.starbucks.com/">Starbucks</a> Coffee Company&rsquo;s app owes its latest success to a new reward program
Notifications. Regardless you want to build your own restaurant app or to provide discovery and booking services, you can keep your app&rsquo;s users informed about the latest deals using email and push notifications. If the deals are regular and fair, and the notifications are personalized, people will anticipate them and, thus, appreciate notifications as a useful service rather than as annoying spam.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">5. Delivery</h2>
Today, extending a restaurant service with the food delivery feature becomes a reasonable option for restaurant mobile app developers. And while it may not be the primary feature to include in a new app, it&rsquo;s still a prospective direction for restaurant services.
Moreover, there are restaurants that serve their customers only with food delivery using mobile apps and websites for ordering. One of the most successful among the delivery-only restaurants is Ando, a part of a large US-based restaurant chain <a href="https://momofuku.com/">Momofuku</a>.
<img style="width: 800px; height: 479px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/223/content_ando_roll.jpg" alt="ando food delivery app" />
Momofuku&rsquo;s Ando - a delivery-only restaurant operating via an iOS app and a website
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">6. More payment options</h2>
Online payments are a big thing now. All types of digital solutions dealing with commerce have adopted it, so have restaurant apps.&nbsp;
There are two types of online payments you can adopt as a restaurant app developer to make restaurant services more effective. The first is mobile payments processed via payment gateways such as Stripe or Braintree (a PayPal subsidiary).
However, restaurant owners may dislike this idea if mobile payments service is provided by a booking platform since it would mean more additional fees that may have a negative impact on the ROI.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">7. Sufficient feedback</h2>
The last for this article but not the least important thing for a business&rsquo;s success is gathering visitor&rsquo;s feedback. Most of the restaurant apps and food discovery platforms provide users with the possibility to leave a review on their restaurant visit.
User reviews play two important roles at the same time. First, as a business owner or/and service provider, you can get feedback on your services to understand how to improve them, thus satisfying your customers even more. But - not less importantly - your visitors&rsquo; reviews act as additional motivators for other people to visit a certain restaurant. Thus, it may be a logical decision to place user reviews on the apps/restaurant&rsquo;s website and allow people to share their reviews.
Want more insights on <a href="online-food-ordering-systems-how-to-create-a-restaurant-online-ordering-website" target="_blank" rel="noopener">restaurant app development</a> for your business? <a href="https://agilie.com/contacts">Contact us</a>, and we&rsquo;ll be happy to discuss it with you!

Let's explore how a restaurant&nbsp;can acquire more customers and provide better services adopting mobile technologies.

Let's explore how a restaurant can acquire more customers and provide better services adopting mobile technologies.

7 Most Important Things Mobile Apps Can Provide to Restaurant Businesses

Last weekend was truly rich with happy events for Agilie! While our CEO, Sergey Gladun, was nominated and won the third prize as a CEO of the Year at the Outsource People conference, our football team became the absolute champions by achieving the top position in the Dnipro Football IT League and winning the League Cup!
Dnipro Football IT League is the regional football/soccer championship where teams from local IT companies compete for fun and to prove they&rsquo;re good not only in software development and modern technologies. The League features playing seasons a year: one takes place in Spring, the other is in Autumn. Last weekend&rsquo;s games concluded the Autumn season of 2016.
<img style="width: 720px; height: 960px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/212/content_14991928_10211040269632265_4299595871486949028_n.jpg" alt="IT League Cup" />
On Saturday, November 5th, the Agilie team played the final Cup game, having defeated our colleagues from Playtika. A quick goal in the first minutes of the game brought confidence in our guys, which helped them to score five more goals and finish the game with a score of 6:0.
On the next day, November 6th, our team played the season&rsquo;s last game in the IT League Championship. This game wasn&rsquo;t a decisive one for our team - we have ensured our championship about a game ago. But it was decisive for our rivals, Noosphere - they had to struggle for the second position in the table. They almost did it: after the half-time Agilie was losing 1:0. But our guys managed to overcome and scored two goals in the second half of the game, winning with a score of 1:2.
Another big thing to celebrate about the season&rsquo;s finale is the becoming of our bombardier, Eugene Kovalenko, the top goalscorer both in the Championship (14 goals after 7 games) and in the Cup (7 goals after 4 games, two of which were scored in the final).
Agilie had won the Cup before - during the Autumn season of 2015. And it&rsquo;s also noteworthy that this year was Agilie&rsquo;s debut in the Championship after ascending from the lower league, the First Division. And the guys aren&rsquo;t going to stop on that!

Our football team became the absolute champions by achieving the top position in the Dnipro Football IT League's Championship!

Our football team became the absolute champions by achieving the top position in the Dnipro Football IT League's Championship and winning the League Cup!

Agilie’s Football Team Becomes the Absolute Champions of the Dnipro Football IT League Autumn Season 2016

Read our breakdown of today's restaurant apps&rsquo; market, and learn what problems such apps&nbsp;can solve both for restaurants and for guests.

A table booking and food discovery platform or a branded restaurant app? A breakdown of today's restaurant apps’ market and the problems such apps can solve both for restaurants and for guests.

What Type of Restaurant App Is Best for Your Business

Over the last several years, many large television companies went beyond blue screens and presented mobile apps that let their audience watch TV content live or on demand. Apart from that, TV companies also offer mobile apps specifically designed to promote and extend the experience of the fan-favorite TV shows.
In this article, we&rsquo;ll find out how local TV channels can benefit from applying these ideas and developing a mobile app for TV content streaming.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">Live video streaming apps provided by TV networks</h2>
You might have already run across apps like HBO Now, Fox Now, <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.foodnetwork.watcher&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Watch Food Network</a>, <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.cbs.app" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">CBS All Access</a> offered by television companies from all around the world, that provide full access to their channels&rsquo; content.
The major selling point of these paid subscription-only apps is that they allow their users to save money by subscribing only to the channel they want to watch, never needing to buy the full cable TV package.&nbsp;
<img style="width: 800px; height: 474px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/668/content_content_hbo_now_roll.jpg" alt="HBO now app" width="800" height="474" />
HBO NOW app by HBO company
Meanwhile, some companies - such as British ITV with their <a href="https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/itvx/id446079916" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ITVHub</a> and ITV Essentials - offer a freemium model. The subscription in this case only removes ads from broadcasts.
The same companies have also rolled out a handful of apps dedicated to their most popular shows like Game of Thrones, The Kitchen, America&rsquo;s/Britain&rsquo;s Got Talent and others. These apps are aimed to expand viewers&rsquo; experience, gather feedback, and, of course, promote primary TV production.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">What additional value a mobile app can bring to your TV audience</h2>
So, how can your television company or product apply these ideas and go mobile using <a href="how-to-create-a-live-video-streaming-website-like-twitch-and-get-your-revenue" target="_blank" rel="noopener">video streaming technologies</a>?
First of all, moving the whole broadcasting schedule of your channel to the mobile live streaming format might be a too hasty and costly decision, regardless if you&rsquo;re broadcasting locally or countrywide.
The safer option in both cases is to start by testing the waters and rolling out an app dedicated to your most popular product. It may be a cooking show, a travel show, a talent show - anything that establishes an emotional connection with the major part of your audience.
As a result, you&rsquo;ll be able to retain your audience and to acquire new viewers. Here are the features that will help you do that.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">1. Mobile access</h3>
This is one of few cases when the phrase &ldquo;anytime, anywhere&rdquo; actually makes sense. Expanding your television production to <a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/technology/mobile-development" target="_blank" rel="noopener">mobile devices</a> will significantly increase your broadcast range, both in geographical and demographical meanings.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">2. Notifications about the upcoming episodes or broadcasts</h3>
Mobile users are always online. Thus, another benefit of mobile broadcasting is that you can notify users with the help of push notifications. Remind them about the upcoming viewings of the new episodes of your show or inform them about important events they can catch turning on your channel.
Notifications sent at the right time will ensure viewers from missing new episodes, which, in its turn, will ensure you from losing the audience. And even more - notifications also help you feed the audience&rsquo;s interest in your primary TV content.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">3. Watching video live or on demand</h3>
Apart from airing new episodes and broadcasts, you can let users rewatch on demand previous streams that will be stored in a cloud.&nbsp;
If you start with a smaller app dedicated to one show only, you won&rsquo;t need significant server capacities. Of course, in case you&rsquo;ll decide to go further and streaming live all your TV content, be prepared for greater server-side expenses.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">4. Gathering feedback from the audience</h3>
Sometimes, it&rsquo;s really hard for TV broadcasters to get reliable information on how the audience is engaged with their production. In a mobile app, on the other hand, you have two ways to get feedback and measure people&rsquo;s engagement.
First, organizing various user polls will help you both gather feedback on your show and engage people by providing them with a possibility to influence the future broadcasts by their vote.
Second, using app analytics tools, you can effectively track user engagement while they watch the broadcasts and interact with the app itself. Thanks to that, you will know how to make both your mobile and television products better and more engaging for viewers.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">5. Social features for community building</h3>
Almost any modern mobile app has social elements. And that&rsquo;s surely a must-have feature if you want to build a community of devoted and engaged active users.&nbsp;
You can encourage users to invite their friends and followers from social networks like Facebook and Twitter, as well as to interact with each other within your app discussing new episodes and participating in polls.&nbsp;
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">6. Unified login system</h3>
Implementing the unified login system makes adding connections from other social networks much easier for users. Moreover, new users will feel more comfortable if your app gives them options to log in quickly using their existing profiles in social networks.
<h3 style="text-align: justify;">7. Unique content</h3>
Many TV channels provide online access to their content via social media and video hosting services like YouTube. However, such an approach makes your online content too scattered around social media and difficult to find. It also makes your content totally non-unique. Offering exclusive, well-structured and accessible content in your app will motivate the TV audience to try your mobile product.
<img style="width: 800px; height: 463px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/641/content_content_b_live_roll_2.jpg" alt="b.live live video streaming app" width="800" height="463" />
b.live video live video streaming app by Agilie
Feel free to <a href="https://agilie.com/contacts" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">contact us</a> if you are interested in more ways to expand your TV products&rsquo; audience or want to hear about other possible applications of video streaming technologies.&nbsp;Also, we're more than happy to create for you a <a href="how-to-create-a-live-video-streaming-website-like-twitch-and-get-your-revenue" target="_blank" rel="noopener">service to share video online</a>!

In this article, we&rsquo;ll find out how local TV channels can benefit from applying these ideas and developing a mobile app for TV content streaming.

Over last several years, many large television companies went beyond blue screens and presented mobile apps that let their audience watch TV content live or on demand. Let's, find out how local TV channels can benefit from applying these ideas and developing a mobile app for TV content streaming.

7 Benefits a Video Streaming App Can Provide to Your TV Production

In December 2015, Apple released a new provider API for Apple Push Notification service (APNs). This API is based on the HTTP/2 network protocol and allows app developers to send remote notifications to their app on iOS, tvOS, and OS X devices, and to Apple Watch via iOS.
We&rsquo;ve analyzed the new provider API, and in this article, we&rsquo;ll present a breakdown of its most important features and the benefits this long-awaited update brings to iOS developers.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">Why we needed this APNs API update</h2>
APNs debuted back in iOS 3 era, and has remained largely unchanged throughout all these years, even despite implementing APNs has always been somewhat problematic for the app developers. Here are only some of the issues that were making the work with APNs too time-consuming and complex:
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Notifications had to be serialized to a binary format and sent individually using a secure TCP socket.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Sockets required Apple&rsquo;s SSL certificate to be opened in.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">All - Development, AdHoc, App Store, and VoIP apps - had to use different certificates.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">We had to use a separate binary TCP socket API to check for unsubscribed devices in order to avoid sending future notifications to them.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">All errors led to the TCP socket closing.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Error codes were too generalized which made it difficult to identify the exact causes of errors.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">A high notification throughput required multiple simultaneous connections to be opened.</li>
</ul>
The new provider API finally fixes all these issues making Apple Push Notifications service much more fast and convenient thanks to HTTP/2 protocol and JSON data interchange format.
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">New features</h2>
The HTTP/2 APNs provider API makes our life as developers much easier by the following things:
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify;">&nbsp;A JSON-based request-response protocol</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">APNs now sends 200 Success Response on each notification</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Errors are now getting a JSON-string response with detailed error descriptions</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Message length increased from 2048 bytes to 4096 bytes, which enables to add extra content to notifications (not just text, but also images and GIFs)</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Compression allows to reduce the number of simultaneous connections to sustain a notification throughput</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">The connection status check with the HTTP/2 PING Frame</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Topics support - you can now identify topics (bundle identifiers) for your notification</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">The <a href="https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/IDEs/Conceptual/AppDistributionGuide/AddingCapabilities/AddingCapabilities.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40012582-CH26-SW11" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Universal Push Notification Client SSL Certificate</a> for Development, AdHoc, App Store, and VoIP apps</li>
</ul>
<img style="width: 800px; height: 472px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/attachments/2088/content_http_2_-_1_updated.jpg" alt="Diagram showing push notification flow between a server and Apple Push Notification Service (APNS) via HTTP/2 TLS connection." />
The updated push notifications delivery service&nbsp;protocol
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">How the HTTP/2 protocol makes notifications more effective</h2>
The HTTP/2 is basically an extension of the previous HTTP 1.x standards. This means that, although HTTP/2 eradicates the performance limitations of the previous protocols, the core concepts remain the same, and the developers don&rsquo;t need any app-level changes to update the existing notification systems.
Binary framing layer
The performance enhancements of HTTP/2 are possible thanks to the new binary framing layer. It introduces a more effective way how to encapsulate and transmit HTTP messages between the client and server.
<img style="width: 800px; height: 377px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/164/content_http_2_-_2.png" alt="Diagram illustrating the difference between HTTP/1.1 and HTTP/2.0 request framing, showing HTTP/2's binary framing of headers and data." />
Binary framing layer
The binary framing layer splits all HTTP/2 communication into smaller messages and frame, encoding them in binary format. Yet, the apps will be unaware of those changes - all changes happen on a client-server level: while the HTTP semantics remains the same, only the way how it&rsquo;s being transmitted and encoded is now different.
Also, with the new binary framing mechanism, we can say&nbsp;farewell to parallel TCP connections. Now, splitting streams into many interleaved and prioritized frames makes connections persistent and fast since it requires only one connection per origin.
Data exchange mechanism
The new mechanism of data exchange is based on three components: 1) Streams, 2) Messages, and 3) Frames.&nbsp;
All communication goes through a single TCP connection that can carry any number of streams.
Stream is a two-directional flow of bytes that happens during the connection and transmits messages. Each stream carries messages using a unique identifier and optional priority information.
Message is a logical request or response mapped by a sequence of frames.
Frame is the smallest unit of communication in HTTP/2. Each frame contains a header that identifies the stream the frame belongs to.
Hence, the HTTP/2 protocol communication is realized through the exchange of binary-encoded frames which are mapped to messages. Messages, in their turn, belong to particular streams. All these components are multiplexed within a TCP connection and ensure the best performance the HTTP protocol ever had.
Request and response multiplexing
As mentioned above, the binary framing layer in HTTP/2 enables full request and response multiplexing within a single TCP connection: first, the client and the server breaks an HTTP message down into independent frames, then interleave them, and finally reassemble them on the output.
This improvement alone leads to a number of performance benefits for push notifications, including:
<ul>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Interleaving multiple requests and/or responses without blocking on any one</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Interweaving the logical streams over a single TCP connection without head-of-line blocking</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Using a single connection to deliver multiple simultaneous requests and responses</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Removing of the unnecessary HTTP/1.x workarounds that we were using to compensate the previous protocol&rsquo;s shortcomings</li>
</ul>
<img style="width: 800px; height: 294px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/166/content_http_2_-_3.png" alt="Diagram illustrating HTTP/2.0 connection with multiple concurrent streams of data and headers." />
Three parallel streams being transmitted between the client and the server within one connection
Header compression
Each HTTP transfer carries a set of headers with metadata that describe the transferred resource and its properties. In HTTP/1.x, headers were sent as plain text &nbsp;adding a considerable weight. In HTTP/2, request and response header metadata are compressed using the HPACK compression format.&nbsp;
To compress headers, HPACK uses two techniques:
<ol>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Encoding the transmitted header fields using a static <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huffman_coding" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Huffman code</a>, which reduces their individual transfer size.</li>
<li style="text-align: justify;">Encoding the transmitted header fields using an indexed list of previously transferred values as a reference for the effective reconstruction of the full header keys and values.</li>
</ol>
<img style="width: 800px; height: 527px;" src="https://d12zh9bqbty5wp.cloudfront.net/ckeditor_assets/pictures/167/content_http_2_-_4.png" alt="Diagram showing HTTP/2 header compression with shared fields between requests." />
HPACK&nbsp;header compression for HTTP/2
<h2 style="text-align: justify;">Conclusion</h2>
Before the update, Apple Push Notifications service was limited by the shortcomings of the HTTP/1.1 protocol. The protocol&rsquo;s forcing to use multiple TCP connections to process multiple requests simultaneously had a huge negative impact on the network performance. The old APNs also required different certificates for different app builds throughout the development process course&nbsp;and was making it almost impossible to track the sent notifications.
These and many other issues were unnecessarily time- and resource-consuming for us as app developers.&nbsp; The new APNs provider API employing HTTP/2 protocol solves all major problems the previous API had, allows to eradicate unnecessary workarounds, greatly increases performance, and reduces the overall development time.
&nbsp;
Further reading on APNs and HTTP/2:
What&rsquo;s New In Apple Push Notification Service / WWDC16
<a href="https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/RemoteNotificationsPG/Chapters/Introduction.html" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Local and Remote Notification Programming Guide / Apple Developer</a>
<a href="https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2016/02/getting-ready-for-http2/" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Getting Ready For HTTP/2: A Guide For Web Designers And Developers / Smashing Magazine</a>

In December 2015, Apple released a new provider API for Apple Push Notification service (APNs).&nbsp;

APNs provider API is based on the HTTP/2 network protocol and allows app developers to send remote notifications to their app on iOS, tvOS, and OS X devices, and to Apple Watch via iOS. We’ve analyzed the new provider API, and now present a breakdown of its most important features and the befits it provides to iOS developers.

HTTP/2-Based Provider API for APNS: The Most Important Features And Benefits for App Development

Business owners considering mobile apps development whether for clients or internal company usage may choose among three options of apps &ndash; native, web or hybrid applications. Let us analyze each type, its pros and cons, and decide which of them will be the most suitable option in each case and will meet the requirements in mobile app development.
Native Applications
These apps are developed for a definite platform &amp; are directly installed at a user&rsquo;s smartphone or tablet (filling some storage capacity). Such applications have to be downloaded by a user in an app store of a platform needed.
With native applications companies may create a customized product to provide a user with an app that is easy to use along with the other channels that are being used already. Such continuity is one of the basic advantages of native app development.
Some other benefits of native apps:
<ul>
<li>- Geolocation enables companies to customize their services and personalize loyalty programs. Customers may get notified about physical shops nearby or have a chance to get a regional discount.</li>
<li>- Data of user&rsquo;s activities (or inactivity) can be easily collected and analyzed, and in such a way evaluation of app effectiveness or its options is simplified.</li>
</ul>
And presumptive drawbacks:
<ul>
<li>- Native apps are usually more expensive in developing, especially for companies that need apps on multiple OS platforms</li>
<li>- Native applications are to be approved by each app store, and the process of drawing attention to it might be difficult (unless it is an app for internal company usage)</li>
</ul>
Web Applications
It seems quite clear &ndash; such apps run through a web-browser on a user&rsquo;s device. These applications are actually custom-designed websites that are built in order to look &amp; be used like native apps, though in reality they are not stored on a user's device. They can be compared with the cloud storage and data on a hard drive of the computer. When thoroughly designed (this includes sizing and scrolling), web applications often run as native apps.
Here are some key advantages of web applications:
<ul>
<li>- Web-based apps are easier to control and they can run on any OS platform</li>
<li>- Developers can offer applications without approving them by any app stores</li>
<li>- Faster cycle development using CSS, HTML and JavaScript</li>
</ul>
And some disadvantages:
Web applications do not access a user's device. As a result, this limits some additional app options that might have been useful for customizing an app
<ul>
<li>- They can be used only through the web, which means safety control is vastly decreased</li>
<li>- Searching for an app might be difficult because there are no any cataloged app store with search option in it</li>
</ul>
Hybrid applications
Hybrid app is a middle type between native &amp; web applications. Actually they are made so they look and feel like native applications. They also have to be installed on a user's smartphone and can be found in app stores. The difference is that they necessarily must be hosted within a native app and run through the WebView, so in such a way to get an access to the user's data for wider possibilities.
Additional options of hybrid apps:
<ul>
<li>- Hybrid applications have the best functionality and customization for a user</li>
<li>- Developers are not limited by a single platform, they can build a hybrid application that will work with several platforms (if it runs as a native app)</li>
<li>- Hybrids is a great option for developers that create visually intense applications, for instance, games (they would not perform properly as web apps)</li>
</ul>
Anyway, there are some disadvantages that are worth considering when choosing a hybrid app:
<ul>
<li>- In case of very complicated applications it is better to do them native</li>
<li>- Its development demands additional time &amp; efforts (compared with web apps), in order to make it feel &amp; look for a user like native</li>
<li>- App stores may refuse hybrid apps that do not work smoothly</li>
</ul>
Choosing an appropriate type of a mobile application is a very important stage in its development, that is influenced by several factors, such as technical evaluation by developers, necessity of the access to the data on a device, influence of the Internet speed on an application, etc.
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&nbsp;Let us analyze each application type, its pros, and cons, and decide which of them will be the most suitable option in&nbsp;mobile app development.

Business owners considering mobile apps development may choose among three options of apps – native, web or hybrid applications.

Choosing Between Native vs. Web vs. Hybrid App

Traveling&hellip; there is a lot hidden in this word. After all, everyone likes to travel, and in order to make a trip the most pleasant event, one needs to plan it thoroughly, without missing important points.&nbsp;
Some people prefer to delegate the preparation process to the travel agents; nevertheless, many smartphone and tablet users are happy to organize every step of it on their own, since convenient mobile apps for travelers can simplify and improve any journey and complete it with better impressions.
Moreover, there&rsquo;re also mobile applications for travel agencies: programs able to become loyal assistants to tour operators. However, let's discuss the issue in order!
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Travel-management software solutions</h2>
Tour apps are useful not only to independent travelers: booking with a travel agency can also be made easier with mobile services with their real-time trip information and a lot of other cool features. And it means the tourism business will benefit by deciding to create its own application.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Benefits of mobile solutions for travel businesses:</h3>
<ul style="list-style-type: disc;">
<li dir="ltr">
simplification of work. Mobile applications for tour operators simplify the work of your employees. So, they&rsquo;ll fulfill their duties faster and more efficiently.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
less staff. Among others, you'll be able to manage with fewer staff, which implies cost savings.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
effective promotion platform. The app for tour operators helps you promote your agency: say, with the help of notifications and other useful features.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
loyalty programs. Permanent access to personal user data and advanced analytical tools allow composing individual offers and sending them to your customers.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
an additional source of monetization. Why not? One more resource of earnings never hurts!
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
modern trend. Technologies are developing, and your business is developing with them. Your company has become modern. That&rsquo;s good too!
</li>
</ul>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">What matters to travel customers</h2>
The best travel apps for iOS and Android are in the top of popularity because they pay attention to the following factors (and you should be in their track, we mean - do the same!):
<ol style="list-style-type: decimal;">
<li dir="ltr">
Intuitive UI/UX. The thoughtful app design is the first step on the path to its success with users. You must ensure maximum intuitiveness of the interface of your program, make it user-friendly.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
advanced functionality. You should offer the user the maximum of possibilities to simplify his trip: assistance in packing, a GPS guide, booking features, etc.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
high speed of application. Of course, mobile solutions for travel businesses should work quickly and efficiently. It depends a lot on the developers, therefore, be sure you've hired a team of real professionals.&nbsp;
</li>
</ol>
<a class="ckeditor-wrapblock" href="https://agilie.com/blog/how-to-build-a-travel-app-for-frequent-travelers" target="_blank" rel="noopener">&nbsp;Do you want to learn more about creating successful travel apps? Read our article! </a>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Types of tourism applications</h2>
Let&rsquo;s list the main types of travel apps.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">#1. Mobile applications to choose and buy airline tickets</h3>
Using such apps allows a user to select or create an ideal route, buy or book airplane tickets, choose the best seat aboard, and monitor the plane&rsquo;s location from the mobile device.
Among the best flight-tracking apps, there are <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hopper.mountainview.play&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Hopper</a> and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=net.skyscanner.android.main&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Skyscanner.</a>
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">#2. Accommodations booking</h3>
Of course, the primary task of these apps is to improve the process of booking a hotel, finding a hostel or a room to sleep, etc.
However, mobile application development would be useful not only in trying to find a hotel in any city; it&rsquo;ll also simplify comparing prices from the leading booking systems, which, in turn, will help the user to make the most beneficial choice.
Market leaders include <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.airbnb.android&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Airbnb</a> and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.booking&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Booking.com</a>.
&nbsp;Do you want to order hotel app development? That way! 
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">#3. Guides and maps</h3>
Mobile apps for tourists contain information about sightseeing, shops, cafes, restaurants, bars, and many other interesting places in the city that you decide to visit.
In addition, such a real-time GPS travel locator helps users navigate the area without any problems, which is especially important when you are in an unfamiliar country.
The most popular apps with real-time routes are, of course, <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.maps&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Google Maps</a> and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.citymapper.app.release&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Citymapper</a>.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">#4. Travel Planning Apps</h3>
These apps can also be great helpers when preparing to go off on a journey. They are helping:
<ul style="list-style-type: disc;">
<li dir="ltr">
make a list of things you should take with you on the road;
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
think of places to visit at your destination beforehand;
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
take care of all possible routes in advance;
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
and so on. There&rsquo;re a great many helpful tips you can get.
</li>
</ul>
Best examples of this kind of travel applications: <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tripit&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Triplt</a>, <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.YRH.PackPoint&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Packpoint</a>.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">#5. Entertainment Planning Apps</h3>
Even if your trip is business in nature, you're likely to want to make time to see the most important sights. And applications with real-time trip information are the best way to find out what exactly is worth visiting in a particular country.
Among travel apps of the sort are <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.yelp.android&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Yelp</a> and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tripadvisor.tripadvisor&amp;hl=en" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">TripAdvisor</a>.
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Services, hidden inside travel technology</h2>
Most travel applications offer quite ordinary functionality, but sometimes the owners of these programs come up with the idea of truly unique features that make the app special and remarkable.
So, let's look at the mobile application development and see in what way it can be useful to a traveler (besides the obvious benefits):
<ol style="list-style-type: decimal;">
<li dir="ltr">
Visa processing: mobile applications, created in order to prepare documents for visa processing, contain all the necessary information about consulates, visa application centers, and everything you need to know before submitting the documents. Such applications provide users with a list of countries and documentation packages aimed at any type of visa.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
Communication apps: apps focused on communicating with people would be useful not only in your everyday life, but they&rsquo;re also able to become important during the trip, as they&rsquo;ll help you to translate any phrase to the local language from your native tongue.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
Mobile apps that will introduce the local cuisine of your destination: these products will become essential when picking a restaurant with national or regional food, special design, and atmosphere. Besides that, there are feedbacks, comments, and photos from other users in such apps.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
Mobile banking: mobile banking applications will assist you with a set of financial questions and point you towards the nearest ATM or local branch of a twinning bank.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
Other interesting features; good examples: smoke detector, door lock, online travel dashboard, urgent phone numbers. It all depends on your imagination and the skills of the developers you found.
</li>
</ol>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">How we create mobile apps for travel businesses</h2>
Now it&rsquo;s time to briefly describe how we create travel apps able to attract and retain as many users as possible in order to monetize the audience and strengthen business positions.
<ol style="list-style-type: decimal;">
<li dir="ltr">
business expertise, including market research and competitor analysis, as well as strategy development;
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
creating a portrait of the target audience. We identify the needs of your average user to find out what exactly he's interested in. What features should your app offer? Making real-time routes? Booking? What else?
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
positioning and naming. Based on the results of the previous stages, we formulate the key idea of your service (positioning) and, of course, give it a name.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
app design and operation logic. Our experts are working on how the app is going to look, and how it&rsquo;ll work, on what principle.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
writing code. This means the process of developing iOS and/or Android applications.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
testing, the purpose of which is to ensure the application is working as it should.
</li>
<li dir="ltr">
product publication and support, the last equally important stage of development.
</li>
</ol>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Conclusion</h2>
If you&rsquo;re a tourist, we hope now you feel more confident and relaxed while traveling, having your mobile device within reach and equipped with up-to-date development products!
And if you're the owner of a travel company, then we're sure we made you think of increasing your business efficiency with a top-quality app for tour operators. And we're happy to help!&nbsp;
<a href="https://agilie.com/contacts" target="_blank" rel="nofollow noopener">Contact</a> if you&rsquo;re ready to cooperate.
Faithfully, Agilie team.

Traveling&hellip; there is a lot in this word. Everyone likes to travel, and in order to make a trip the most pleasant event, one needs to plan it thoroughly and not to miss important points.&nbsp;

More and more people prefer to use their smartphones and tablets to organize a trip since convenient mobile apps for travelers can simplify and improve this process 

Mobile Apps for Travel Agencies and Private Travelers

The rise of crypto wallets represents&ensp;a significant innovation in fintech. Those wallets can be very useful for businesses because, with them, many people can have access to funds depending on roles and permissions.
Depending on the type, cryptocurrency wallets also help in managing digital assets and allow businesses or individuals to control funds without banking, as they retain the full autonomy of&ensp;funds, or even trade assets without manual transfers. In this article, we are going to see what is the difference between a custodial and non-custodial wallet.
<div id="form-description" class="form-description" data-title="Key Takeaways" data-text="The custodial wallet requires identity verification, breaching the user&rsquo;s anonymity, while the non-custodial wallet is pseudonymous. 
Since non-custodial wallets operate independently of centralized exchanges (CEXs), transaction speed depends on blockchain network conditions, leading to delays in crypto operations. 
Although the custodial wallet relies on the Know Your Customer policy, the risks of cyber security attacks arise because of the required identity verification.">
<div class="form-description-title">Key Takeaways</div>
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
The custodial wallet requires identity verification, breaching the user&rsquo;s anonymity, while the non-custodial wallet is pseudonymous.&nbsp;
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Since non-custodial wallets operate independently of centralized exchanges (CEXs), transaction speed depends on blockchain network conditions, leading to delays in crypto operations.&nbsp;
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Although the custodial wallet relies on the Know Your Customer policy, the risks of cyber security attacks arise because of the required identity verification.
</li>
</ul>
</div>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Foreword: The Essence of Private Keys</h2>
Hold on! Why is it important to discuss the private key and how it comes with the custodial and non-custodial wallets? Let&rsquo;s define this cryptographic element and analyze its functions and importance for crypto wallets.&nbsp;
The crypto wallet generates a private key, which represents an alphanumeric code consisting of a large string of letters and numbers. The primary functions of a private key include enabling the users to authorize transactions and prove ownership of their assets.
This alphanumeric cipher matters to any crypto wallet type as it generates a digital signature. A private key is used to sign the transaction, which is transmitted to the blockchain, but prior to being added to the block, it requires verification. The computers operating the blockchain check the user&rsquo;s public key to verify the digital signature, and if it is correct the transaction is approved and recorded permanently on the blockchain.&nbsp;
The private and public keys are paired, which ensures the transaction&rsquo;s security due to the resistance to tampering and the impossibility of making any changes on the block. Hence, private keys are central elements of a crypto wallet, so let&rsquo;s discuss their essence in custodial and non-custodial wallets.&nbsp;
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">What Is a Custodial Wallet?</h2>
The custodial wallet meaning can be defined as a wallet in which a third party, such as an exchange or bank, holds the private keys of the users. This means that the client is not in full control of their funds, as they rely on the custodian who secures and manages their transactions.&nbsp;
There are the following features of the custodial wallets:
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Simplified Usability
</li>
</ul>
The custodial wallets represent an opportunity for beginners to trade their crypto assets without managing private keys.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Options for Account Recovery
</li>
</ul>
If users lose access to their accounts, they will be able to recover their funds as the custodian holds their private keys on the centralized server. The users will only have to verify their identity.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Support Opportunities
</li>
</ul>
A central unity manages the client&rsquo;s wallet, providing them with support like undoing the transaction.
Some of the best custodial wallets to consider are: Coinbase, Gemini, BitMex, BitGo, Binance, and Bitfinex.
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">What Is a Non-Custodial Wallet?</h2>
When analyzing the non-custodial vs custodial wallet, the first one provides clients with full ownership of their private keys and funds, respectively. This autonomy defines the non-custodial wallet meaning that no third party will handle the user&rsquo;s funds and operations. This excludes issues like account freezing and withdrawal restrictions. There are the following distinctive features of the non-custodial wallets:
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
User&rsquo;s Full Ownership
</li>
</ul>
The non-custodial wallets function within the decentralized ecosystem, meaning that no centralized unity will manage the wallet.
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Direct Blockchain Interaction
</li>
</ul>
A non-custodial wallet does not require an intermediary; transactions occur directly on the blockchain.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Increased Privacy
</li>
</ul>
The users don&rsquo;t have to abide by the Know Your Customer policy and verify their identity in the non-custodial wallet. This crypto wallet type preserves pseudoanonimity.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-property: all;" href="https://agilie.com/blog/digital-wallets-types-ideas-and-future-of-such-products" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="float: left;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1740483774764.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Gain insights into the essence of e-wallets, their benefits, and examples.</a>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Difference Between Custodial and Non-Custodial Wallet</h2>
Based on the aforementioned analysis of two crypto wallet types, their meaning, advantages, and disadvantages, it would be essential to provide a short summative recap, as well as additional details on the differences between the custodial wallet vs non-custodial wallet, focusing on the following metrics.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Security</h3>
<h4 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Custodial Wallet</h4>
The custodial wallet is less secure than its non-custodial counterpart, considering its vulnerability to cyberattacks. Hackers can attack the centralized servers and obtain access to multiple accounts.
Credential harvesting is a phishing type of cyberattack which aims to steal a user&rsquo;s login and password so that the attacker can access their account. The attackers send the falsified site links, almost identical to the real ones, via SMS or email, so by entering their credentials, the victim provides them with access to their funds.&nbsp;
<h4 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Non-Custodial Wallet</h4>
The non-custodial wallets depend on the private keys owned by the users, which decreases the risks of theft. Nevertheless, attackers can obtain the key due to malware attacks, which can infect the computer or smartphone as in the case of clipboard hijacking malware attack.&nbsp;
The malware functions, so to say, silently in the device, monitoring the clipboard. When the user copies the wallet address, the malware substitutes it with the attacker&rsquo;s one, so the victim sends them their funds unintentionally.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Ownership of Private Keys</h3>
<h4 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Custodial Wallet</h4>
In the custodial wallet, it&rsquo;s the custodian&rsquo;s responsibility to hold the user&rsquo;s private keys, which limits the latter&rsquo;s control over their funds. This is one of the most significant disadvantages of the custodial wallets for the following reasons:
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Lack of Client&rsquo;s Full Ownership Over Their Finances.
</li>
</ul>
The client has access to accounts but relies heavily on the custodian&rsquo;s controls over the transaction&rsquo;s approval.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Withdrawal and Transaction Restrictions
</li>
</ul>
The custodian can delay or block the transaction based on governmental policies, which can limit the fund movement.&nbsp;
<h4 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Non-Custodial Wallet</h4>
In the non-custodial wallet, the user holds the private keys by themselves, which is simultaneously convenient and requires a decent level of responsibility not to lose them.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
No KYC Compliance
</li>
</ul>
The non-custodial wallet does not rely on the KYC policy, so the user doesn&rsquo;t have to verify their identity to proceed with the transactions, showing their full ownership over their funds.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Ease of Use&nbsp;</h3>
<h4 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Custodial Wallet</h4>
Custodial wallets are easier to use as the client does not have to know the precise details of the exchange work. If the user wants to undo the operation, customer support can help with that.&nbsp;
<h4 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Non-Custodial Wallet</h4>
Non-custodial wallets require decent knowledge about the work of blockchain and smart contracts, as minor mistakes can lead to the loss of funds with no refund option, representing one of the core challenges of this wallet type.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-property: all;" href="https://agilie.com/blog/top-7-crypto-wallet-apps" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="float: left;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1740483930529.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Check out 7 potential crypto wallets you might use.</a>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Choosing the Right&nbsp;Wallet&nbsp;for Your Business Needs</h2>
You might be interested in how to choose the right wallet type per business needs. It's time to discuss the most suitable cases to use custodial and non-custodial cryptocurrency wallets.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Custodial Wallets</h3>
The custodial wallets are a valuable option for businesses that need an insured and regulated service. For instance, Greyscale, a leading crypto asset manager, utilizes Coinbase Custody, which improves its scalability and contributes to success due to alignment with NYC banking laws as the wallet is regulated by NYDFS, one of the most prominent financial regulators in the world.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Non-Custodial Wallets</h3>
The non-custodial wallets are best suited for businesses that manage crypto without third-party integration, and those companies with DeFi projects and NFT platforms. For instance, Open Sea, a web3 marketplace for NFTs, applies Meta Mask, which improves its scalability and success by integrating Layer 2 support like Polygon network for lower fees and faster transactions.
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Who We Are</h2>
Agilie is a European IT outsourcing organization that crafts custom digital products for businesses and startups in fintech, real estate, healthcare, and marketing domains. By providing our clients with three outsourcing models, like the dedicated team, staff augmentation, and project-based outsourcing, Agilie elaborates on tech-savvy software relevant to&nbsp;<a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/fintech" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fintech</a>,&nbsp;<a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/fintech/payment-solutions" target="_blank" rel="noopener">payment solutions</a>, and&nbsp;<a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/fintech/mobile-banking" target="_blank" rel="noopener">mobile banking</a>.&nbsp;
When it comes to the&nbsp;<a href="https://agilie.com/expertise/fintech/blockchain-software" target="_blank" rel="noopener">blockchain software development services</a>, Agilie can help you craft:
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Cryptocurrency
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Crypto Wallets
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Blockchain
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Smart Contracts
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
NFT
</li>
</ul>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Conclusion</h2>
The article analyzed the features, advantages, disadvantages, and differences of custodial vs non-custodial crypto wallet types. Both introduce unique approaches to handling finances, such as the client&rsquo;s full ownership of the private keys versus the custodian&rsquo;s. Nevertheless, when choosing a wallet type, you have to take into account the elements of security, anonymity, and tech knowledge to make your trade or transactions secure and minimize risks.&nbsp;
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-property: all;" href="https://agilie.com/contacts" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="float: left;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1740484028707.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Are you eager to craft a personalized crypto wallet? Then contact us to get a consultation!</a>

Explore the differences between a custodial wallet vs non-custodial wallet, their features, and use cases.

Explore the differences between a custodial wallet vs non-custodial wallet, their features, and use cases.

Custodial vs Non-custodial Wallet: Explained & Compared | Agilie

Learn about the cost of building a banking app based on its features, dev process, UX/UI design, and wireframe.

Learn about the cost of building a banking app based on its features, dev process, UX/UI design, and wireframe.

Banking App Development Cost | Agilie

Blockchain has become a paradigm shift that changes the operations of different industries. Nevertheless, like any other disruptive technology, a lot of myths and misconceptions have appeared. We should differentiate between fact and fiction to use blockchain technology effectively and responsibly. We can better understand what blockchain is (and isn&rsquo;t), how it functions, and the varied applications it holds besides cryptocurrencies by clarifying these misconceptions.
<div id="form-description" class="form-description" data-title="Key Takeaways" data-text="Blockchain is not just about Bitcoin; it is the technology that can transform different fields. 

Blockchains are strong but not flawless, and being aware of the possible weak sections is a very important thing in keeping the network safe.

Educational investment and partnerships with software development experts are the main factors for businesses that will use blockchain technology.">
<div class="form-description-title">Key Takeaways</div>
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Blockchain is not just about Bitcoin; it is the technology that can transform different fields.&nbsp;
</li>
<li dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" aria-level="1">
Blockchains are strong but not flawless, and being aware of the possible weak sections is a very important thing in keeping the network safe.
</li>
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Educational investment and partnerships with software development experts are the main factors for businesses that will use blockchain technology.
</li>
</ul>
</div>
<h2 dir="ltr" role="presentation">&nbsp;Myth 1: Blockchain and Bitcoin Are the Same</h2>
Among the most common myths about blockchain technology is the confusion between the blockchain and Bitcoin. Blockchain and Bitcoin were created simultaneously, so they are widely believed to be the same thing. However, we must understand that blockchain is a much broader term. It is the technology that created Bitcoin. While Bitcoin is indeed the first and most famous application of this technology, equating the two is like saying that Google is the Internet.
Blockchain is a decentralized digital ledger technology (DLT) that records transactions across multiple computers so that the records cannot be altered retroactively, without the alteration of all subsequent blocks and the consensus of the network.
This makes blockchain a naturally secure and transparent method of data and transaction recording.&nbsp;
Bitcoin is a type of digital currency based on blockchain technology and used for secure, anonymous, and decentralized financial transactions. The blockchain of Bitcoin acts as a public ledger for all the transactions in the Bitcoin network, thus, it is possible to transfer digital currency securely without the use of intermediaries like banks or governments.&nbsp;
Blockchain technology can be much broader than purely financial transactions. It can be used in different industries with various aims. Nowadays, many businesses are studying how <a href="https://agilie.com/blog/enterprise-blockchain-development-how-businesses-derive-benefits" target="_blank" rel="noopener">enterprise blockchain development</a> can improve their operations.

Here are a few examples:
Healthcare: Blockchain can guarantee the safety of medical records storage and sharing. Thus, they are only available to authorized personnel and patients and lead to quicker diagnosis and treatment.​
Financial Services: Blockchain is a viable solution for international payments, real-time settlements, and improving transaction transparency and security.
Digital Identity:&nbsp; Blockchain can correct identity theft and fraud by adding digital identities that cannot be changed. For example, Estonia's e-Residency program is the first of its kind, a government-issued digital identity that allows entrepreneurs from anywhere in the world to operate and conduct business online in the EU.
Real Estate: Blockchain can simplify property transactions such as sales, leasing, and financing by reducing paperwork and improving transparency.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-delay: 0s;" href="https://agilie.com/blog/the-evolution-of-blockchain-from-bitcoin-to-business-applications" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="height: 344px; width: 778px;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1716280829344.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Learn more about the evolution of Blockchain from Bitcoin to business applications.</a>
<h2 dir="ltr">Myth 2: Blockchain Transactions Are Always Anonymous</h2>
A frequent mistake people make about blockchain technology is that it is automatically anonymous to its users. However, the truth is more nuanced. Blockchain transactions are not strictly anonymous but pseudonymous.
Pseudonymity means that a user's identity is not directly tied to their blockchain transactions but rather to a digital pseudonym, typically a public key or a blockchain address. These addresses are like a sequence of letters and numbers, giving privacy but not total anonymity.
In contrast, anonymity would mean that the transactions are entirely disconnected from any identity, even a pseudonym, making them untraceable to the user. Blockchain does not usually provide this level of anonymity because the transaction history of each blockchain address is visible to anyone who accesses the blockchain.
Most blockchains are open ledgers, meaning that all transactions are visible to anyone who wishes to view them. This level of transparency ensures that while users' identities are not directly exposed, their transaction histories and patterns can be analyzed.<span style="font-size: 11pt; font-family: Roboto, sans-serif; color: #000000; background-color: transparent; font-weight: 400; font-style: normal; font-variant-ligatures: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-variant-alternates: normal; font-variant-numeric: normal; font-variant-east-asian: normal; font-variant-position: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"> 
<img src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1716280901953.png" alt="Agilie Expert Tip infographic with a lightbulb illustration, offering advice for blockchain systems: educate teams on anonymity and pseudonymity, integrate privacy features like zero-knowledge proofs, update security protocols, plan scalability with privacy using decentralizing nodes or layer-two solutions, and ensure compliance with data privacy regulations." width="2256" height="1616" />
While basic blockchain transactions offer pseudonymity, several enhancements and tools can increase privacy:
1. Mixing Services: Services like CoinJoin allow multiple users to combine their transactions into a single transaction with multiple inputs and outputs. This mixing blurs the traceability of any single coin, making it more difficult to link wallets with identities.
2. Privacy-Focused Cryptocurrencies: Some cryptocurrencies, like Monero and Zcash, are designed specifically to enhance privacy. Monero uses ring signatures and stealth addresses to hide the transactions&rsquo; origins, amounts, and destinations. Zcash allows users to shield transactions completely through its zk-SNARKs technology, which enables transactions to be verified without revealing the sender, receiver, or amount.
3. Use of Multiple Addresses: Users can increase their privacy by using multiple wallets or addresses, dispersing their transactions across several points, which makes it more challenging to link them to a single identity.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-delay: 0s;" href="https://agilie.com/blog/blockchain-tech-trends-how-to-stay-ahead-of-the-curve" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="height: 344px; width: 778px;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1716280997458.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Explore key blockchain technology trends and stay ahead in its innovation with insights and practical examples.</a>
<h2 dir="ltr">Myth 3: Blockchains Are Unhackable</h2>
The idea that blockchains are completely unhackable is a frequently held misconception that can cause a dangerous level of complacency in security measures. While blockchain technology does offer robust security features, it is not immune to vulnerabilities. Knowing the security features employed and the situations in which breaches happen is very important for anyone who wants to use blockchain for their business.
Blockchain technology secures data through several mechanisms:
Cryptography: Every transaction on a blockchain is secured using cryptographic algorithms, which ensure that data can neither be altered nor read without the appropriate cryptographic key.
Decentralization: By distributing copies of the ledger across a network, blockchain reduces the risk of a single point of failure that could compromise the entire system.
Consensus Protocols: Blockchains use various consensus mechanisms, like Proof of Work (PoW) or Proof of Stake (PoS), to agree on the validity of transactions. These protocols prevent a malicious actor from changing even a single aspect of the blockchain.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-delay: 0s;" href="https://agilie.com/expertise/fintech/blockchain-software" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="height: 344px; width: 778px;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1716281102044.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Learn more about our blockchain software development services.</a>
Despite these security measures, there are scenarios where blockchains can and have been compromised.
<h3 dir="ltr">Scenarios Under Which Breaches Have Occurred</h3>
51% Attacks: This type of attack happens when a single entity gains control of more than 50% of the network&rsquo;s mining hash rate or stake, allowing them to manipulate transactions and potentially double-spend coins.&nbsp;
Code Vulnerabilities: <a href="https://agilie.com/blog/secure-smart-contract-design-best-practices-in-solidity-programming" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Smart contracts</a>, which are self-executing contracts with the terms directly written into code, can contain vulnerabilities. One of the most famous incidents is the DAO attack on the Ethereum network. Hackers exploited a vulnerability in the DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) smart contract code to siphon off one-third of the DAO&rsquo;s funds.
Phishing and Social Engineering: End-user security is often the weakest link in a blockchain system. Phishing attacks can allow attackers access to blockchain assets, bypassing network security measures, to steal private keys or wallet credentials.
<img src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1716281254703.png" alt="Agilie Expert Tip infographic with a lightbulb illustration, providing tips to improve blockchain security: conduct regular security audits, consider network security measures like decentralizing mining power or hybrid consensus mechanisms, educate users on securing private keys and recognizing phishing attempts, and implement multi-signature protocols with hardware wallets for offline storage of private keys." width="2256" height="1438" />
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Conclusion</h2>
The blockchain technology is often seen as highly popular and muddled at the same time.&nbsp; Falsified myths are only part of the misconceptions that can mislead such a fantastic technology. Similarly, proper professional knowledge and strategy can help blockchain perform to its potential in various fields.&nbsp;<a href="https://agilie.com/blog/your-own-cryptocurrency-from-scratch-everything-you-need-to-know-to-create-your-cryptocurrency" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Building your own cryptocurrency</a> can be a strategic move for businesses seeking to innovate and tap into new digital markets.
At <a href="https://agilie.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Agilie</a>, we understand that dealing with a complex environment is also a significant challenge. This is why we create powerful blockchain systems and wish to educate our clients regarding the breadth of blockchain-utilizing services. Therefore, such solutions can be tailored to your industry's concrete necessities and problems.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-delay: 0s;" href="https://agilie.com/contacts" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="height: 344px; width: 778px;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1716281316627.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Contact us to find out how our blockchain development services can help you achieve your goal.</a>

Discover the truths about blockchain technology as we debunk common myths and clarify its applications to empower businesses with informed integration.

Discover the truths about blockchain technology as we debunk common myths and clarify its applications to empower businesses with informed integration.

Blockchain Myths Debunked: Separating Fact from Fiction | Agilie

Nowadays, blockchain reshapes the functionality of the fintech industry, invoking a significant interest in institutions that work with financial operations directly. We&rsquo;re talking about accounting, which starts integrating blockchain technology to its daily operations.&nbsp;
Accounting is a noticeable area for blockchain innovation due to the significant improvements it can present. Businesses experience growth of interest in secure financial operations. The elimination of a single-point failure and cryptographic encryption can reduce the dependency on the centralized intermediary and protect financial transactions by improving security and economizing protection costs simultaneously. The article analyzes what is blockchain used for in accounting and its benefits.
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">How Blockchain Is Transforming Accounting</h2>
As a distributed and public ledger, blockchain benefits versatile fintech and business branches due to its possibility to record transactions that cannot be altered. The impact of blockchain in accounting is significant as it eliminates manipulations with records and minimizes human errors. We&rsquo;re going to focus on fraud prevention and error detection capabilities of blockchain in accounting.&nbsp;
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-property: all;" href="https://agilie.com/blog/the-role-of-cryptography-in-blockchain-security" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="float: left;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1739370419274.png" width="100%" height="100%" />In this article you can learn how cryptography makes blockchain safe and the consensus mechanisms its work is based on.</a>
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Fraud Prevention</h3>
Blockchain undermines the pain point of fraudulent actions through immutability and security.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Immutability
</li>
</ul>
As stated above, the transaction is recorded, while the record is immutable. This is important for accounting to fraud prevention because it makes it difficult for fraudsters to manipulate revenue or conceal expenses.
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Safety
</li>
</ul>
Authorized parties can access a real-time ledger, proving that blockchain can reduce the likelihood of fraudulent reporting. The auditors can cross-check the transactions in real-time, which greatly reduces the risk of any manipulations in the financial statements.
Moreover, with triple-entry accounting, the blockchain makes it hard&ensp;to commit double-entry fraud. Transactions are cryptographically linked and recorded in the distributed&ensp;ledger, making identifying fraudulent actions easier.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Error Detection and Overcoming</h3>
Blockchain helps to identify common human-factor mistakes and helps overcome them via smart contracts and AI integration.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Human Errors within Data Entry
</li>
</ul>
Blockchain helps resolve issues like incorrect figures or duplicate entries. Multiple parties validate the transduction cryptographically prior to recording. Smart contracts will automate the transactions, minimizing human input.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Duplicate Transactions
</li>
</ul>
Blockchain can help prevent accidental duplication of invoices, expenses, or payroll payments based on the correct realization of smart contracts or transaction control systems. The chances of record duplication are reduced as each transaction gets a unique cryptographic signature. Blockchain&rsquo;s task is to ensure a real-time reconciliation by underlining the duplicate entries.&nbsp;
<ul style="text-align: justify;">
<li dir="ltr" aria-level="1">
Transaction Misclassification
</li>
</ul>
Another human error in accounting is assigning the wrong category for revenue, expenses, or&ensp;liabilities, which results in erroneous financial statements. Smart contracts and AI analyze transactions and mark inconsistencies, while the immutable ledger ensures proper classification.
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Key Benefits of Blockchain in Accounting</h2>
Accounting organizations can optimize their record processing, minimize fraud, and economize financial input by integrating blockchain technology. Let&rsquo;s analyze the advantages of blockchain in accounting into the following categories.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Transparency</h3>
The blockchain works on the distributed ledger that instantly&ensp;records any transactions and displays them to authorized users. The immutable ledger eliminates the possibility of changes and is deleted once the finance-relevant operation is recorded. Finally, one of the key benefits blockchain brings to accounting is the absence of dependency on centralized units. All the required stakeholders and auditors are independent in verifying transactions.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Security</h3>
Blockchain and accounting are intertwined based on security intensification. Now, let&rsquo;s analyze how exactly blockchain helps accounting improve the security of its operations.&nbsp;&nbsp;
Blockchain assists accounting services in preventing and reducing fraudulent activities due to the cryptographic security mechanisms that protect against unauthorized access. Another way of supporting safety in accounting is securing financial data through advanced cryptographic encryption. Blockchain can prevent unauthorized alterations in the transactions via the consensus mechanisms that verify and record those operations.&nbsp;
Finally, as in blockchain, there is no need to rely on a third party; decentralized storage minimizes the risks of cyberattacks. For instance, Deloitte relies on machine learning in blockchain that helps check, mark anomalies, and set a risk rate for the transaction.&nbsp;
Nevertheless, it is important to remember the existing threats of cyber attacks on the users&rsquo; non-custodial wallets, smart contracts, and network nodes. The intermediary can store data in a centralized server, making it vulnerable to a single-point attack, while in the blockchain, decentralized storage eliminates this single-point failure and reinforces tamper resistance, making the records immutable based on the blockchain hashing.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Efficiency</h3>
Blockchain in accounting applies smart contracts that automate financial transactions. Manual intervention and processing are not required. The ledger facilitates real-time financial reporting, so&ensp;there are no delays in data processing. The distributed nature of the ledger allows auditors to determine if the transaction was legitimate. Overall, blockchain improves the efficiency of accounting services by minimizing the need for repeated data entry, which minimizes human errors.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Cost Savings</h3>
Blockchain minimizes overhead and manual transaction processing by excluding the dependency on third parties and eliminating the need to perform manual audits.&nbsp;
Blockchain favorably affects compliance costs by ensuring automatic alignment with accounting regulations. Finally, blockchain minimizes costs associated with error corrections and fraud detection.&nbsp;
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">How Can Blockchain Be Used in Accounting?</h2>
Indisputably, the organization specializing in accounting can benefit significantly from integrating a decentralized ledger due to improved security, optimized time, and efficiency in verifying and operating transactions. But what are the practical examples of blockchain in accounting? Let&rsquo;s clarify.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Auditing and Assurance</h3>
Traditional accounting depended on third-party confirmations to check and verify whether the financial record was legitimate. Audits were time-consuming due to manual proceeding and verification. Blockchain functionality is based on the smart contract, which benefits audit compliance. It is possible to pre-program specific financial processes to follow audit rules automatically. Auditors don&rsquo;t have to wait for periodic reports. Instead, they can access data in real time.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Tax Compliance</h3>
Traditional manual tax management faced the challenges of income misreporting or purposeful dedication, which led to tax evasion and non-compliance. Here on, tax audits can be time-consuming to complete.
Integrating blockchain into accounting can eliminate invoice falsification. Smart contracts can automate the process of invoice verification in real-time prior to processing the tax claim. However, the correctness of data depends on the source information checked by the accountants. The immutable ledger ensures no record can be altered, eliminating the manipulation of tax-relevant data. Finally, due to the integration with the API of tax offices, smart contracts can calculate and file tax automatically based on recorded transactions.&nbsp;
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Payroll Management</h3>
Payroll management encountered the dilemma of ghost employees who could divert and manipulate funds. Implementing blockchain technology in accounting can eliminate potential fraudulent actions in the following ways. Smart contracts can contribute to payroll automation by the automatic proceedings over the salaries only when the predefined conditions are met. Secondly, in blockchain, the payments will be analyzed only when the ID of the verified worker matches with the work records. The next point is that blockchain ensures the records are tamper-proof, meaning that no insider can manipulate the payroll records.
<h3 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Supply Chain Finances</h3>
The accounting organizations faced the problem of delayed payments from suppliers. The issue emerged because of the prolonged manual invoice verification. Moreover, manual reconciliation between vendors and clients delayed accounting processing. As blockchain provides real-time reconciliation, it can be integrated to eliminate the presented problems. This translates to real-time transaction recordings, removing the need to carry out manual reconciliation. One of the examples of blockchain in accounting is EY&rsquo;s blockchain analyzer reconciler applied to reconcile and match transactions. The approval of received items stimulates automated payment processing, which eliminates data manipulations, providing accounting with real-time financial tracking.&nbsp;
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Agilie, Your Reliable Partner</h2>
Agilie is a European IT outsourcing organization that crafts from scratch and optimizes software solutions that align with our clients' boldest ideas. Specializing in fintech, mobile banking, and payment solutions, our software benefits multiple industries, including fintech, marketing, logistics, healthcare, real estate, etc. We aspire for client-centricity by aligning with the client&rsquo;s unique needs and embedding them into effective and time-preserving SDLC-based product development.&nbsp;
Our&nbsp;<a title="blockchain software services" href="https://agilie.com/expertise/fintech/blockchain-software" target="_blank" rel="noopener">blockchain software services</a>&nbsp;include:&nbsp;
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Blockchain Development
</li>
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NFT Crafting
</li>
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Smart Contract Development
</li>
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Decentralized Finance Development
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</ul>
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-property: all;" href="https://agilie.com/success-stories" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="float: left;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1739370581892.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Gain insights into the versatility of our tech experience with Agilie Success Stories.</a>
<h2 dir="ltr" style="text-align: justify;">Conclusion</h2>
The article answered the question of how is blockchain used in accounting by demonstrating its advantages and use cases. Blockchain technology excludes the reliance on intermediaries and streamlines efficiency by minimizing manual reconciliations and ensuring security and cost-effectiveness.
Smart contracts automate the transaction verification process, can prevent data falsification, and, by operating on decentralized storage, will make sure that no single entity will have control over the financial records and operations. Therefore, it is important to collaborate with skilled IT professionals who can integrate blockchain technology into your system to ensure the security and integrity of your accounting processes.
<a class="incut--wrap" style="transition-property: all;" href="https://agilie.com/contacts" target="_blank" rel="noopener" aria-label="incut"><img style="float: left;" src="https://d3pxw3l8cozu05.cloudfront.net/images/f9e66e179b6747ae54108f82f8ade8b3c25d76fd30afde6c395822c530196169-1739370637771.png" width="100%" height="100%" />Don&rsquo;t hesitate to contact us if you want to integrate blockchain into your accounting services.</a>

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