As supply chains become increasingly digital, organizations face a common challenge: how can trusted product information be shared across multiple companies without relying on a single central authority? This question is becoming even more relevant with the introduction of the Digital Product Passport (DPP), where manufacturers, suppliers, logistics providers, and other stakeholders must exchange accurate, secure, and verifiable information throughout a product’s lifecycle.
The DigInTraCE project addresses this challenge through a Blockchain Module that combines distributed ledger technology, cloud-native infrastructure, and secure integration services into a single platform. Rather than using blockchain as an isolated technology, the solution has been designed to provide a trusted environment where organizations can collaborate while maintaining control over their identities, their data, and the business rules governing the network.
At the core of the platform is Hyperledger Fabric, an enterprise blockchain framework specifically designed for collaborative business environments. Unlike public blockchain networks, where anyone can participate anonymously, Hyperledger Fabric follows a permissioned approach in which every participant is known, authenticated, and authorized before joining the network. This model enables organizations to share information confidently while ensuring that access to data remains controlled and fully auditable.
Figure 1. DigInTraCE network basic architecture
Trust, however, is not created by technology alone. A distributed platform is only effective if all participants agree on how data is managed and validated. For this reason, the DigInTraCE Blockchain Module incorporates governance policies that require transactions and smart contract updates to be approved by multiple organizations before becoming part of the shared ledger. This collaborative decision-making process prevents unilateral changes and ensures that every participant operates under the same agreed business rules.
These business rules are implemented through smart contracts, known in Hyperledger Fabric as chaincodes. DigInTraCE separates its business logic into two specialized chaincodes with complementary responsibilities. The first manages the Digital Product Passport, storing product identification, sustainability indicators, compliance documentation, and other information associated with the product lifecycle. The second records traceability events following the GS1 EPCIS 2.0 standard, allowing every relevant operation performed on a product to be registered in a standardized and interoperable way.
Together, these components create a complete digital history of each product. A Digital Product Passport is created when the product enters the platform, while new traceability events are continuously added as it moves through manufacturing, transportation, and distribution. Because every transaction is validated and permanently recorded on the distributed ledger, authorized participants can reconstruct the complete product history with confidence that the information has not been altered.
Behind these capabilities lies a cloud-native infrastructure designed to support real production environments. The blockchain network is deployed using Kubernetes together with specialized orchestration tools that automate deployment, simplify maintenance, and facilitate the incorporation of new organizations into the platform. This approach provides scalability, resilience, and infrastructure portability while reducing operational complexity and avoiding dependency on a specific cloud provider.
Equally important is the way business applications access blockchain services. Rather than interacting directly with blockchain nodes, applications communicate through a unified REST API that acts as the entry point to the Blockchain Module. This integration layer abstracts the complexity of distributed ledger technology, allowing developers to use familiar web technologies while benefiting from the security and integrity provided by the blockchain.
Security is applied throughout the entire architecture. Every blockchain transaction is digitally signed using certificates issued by trusted Certificate Authorities, ensuring that each operation can be linked to an authenticated organization. At the application level, centralized identity management and role-based authorization control access to blockchain services, while additional permissions can be enforced directly within the smart contracts whenever business requirements demand more granular control.
The result is a platform that goes beyond securely storing information. DigInTraCE provides a trusted collaboration environment where organizations can manage Digital Product Passports and traceability data using shared governance, standardized business processes, and interoperable data models. As regulatory requirements continue to evolve and industrial ecosystems become increasingly interconnected, this architecture offers a flexible foundation capable of supporting new participants, new digital services, and future Digital Product Passport initiatives without compromising trust, security, or scalability.
