Blockchain in a Maintenance Database

Nowadays, data management is part of the maintenance management. Organizations are now gathering a diverse range of data, including information from sensors and operator logs, among others. To structure a database may be a challenge when organizing data collected from sensors on a ship, and the difficulty increases when maintenance managers apply algorithms trying to give early results from data that will support decision-making. A blockchain structure is not unbreakable but is safer than other known structures. It will be exposed how a blockchain structure applied to data collected from equipment may enhance the database integrity and security. A state-of-the-art on blockchain and maintenance is made to expose its advantages in the maintenance management, and then it will be proposed a data structure for a maintenance ship system and present some directions for further studies. Also, the Portuguese Navy maintenance organization for surface ships and the advantages and disadvantages of blockchain in it are presented.