How verification works
Every plant's page says whether its record is intact. This page explains what that check does, and what it doesn't.
What gets recorded
When the field team logs a plant, the entry stores the date and time, the growth stage, the plant's health, observations such as leaf count and pests, a photo if one was taken, and whether GPS was recorded. Entries can be added but never edited or deleted: the database itself refuses changes to old entries.
The fingerprint chain
Each entry gets a fingerprint, a SHA-256 code worked out from everything in the entry plus the fingerprint of the entry before it. Change a single character in an old entry and its fingerprint changes, which breaks the link to every entry after it. A photo's own fingerprint is part of its entry, so a swapped photo breaks the chain too.
What happens when you open a plant's page
The ledger reads that plant's entries in order and works out every fingerprint again from the stored contents. If every one matches, the page shows Record intact with the number of entries and the time of the check. If any entry has been changed or removed, the page says so in red and names the entry where the chain breaks.
What the check does not prove
- It shows the record hasn't changed since each entry was logged. It can't show that an entry was right in the first place. That rests on the field team, with the time, GPS and photos captured on the phone at the moment of logging.
- It isn't a certification of quality, origin or grade. Lab results show the lab that reported them.
- Estimated values come from each plant's growth stage. They are not sale prices.
What stays private
Field notes, the name of the person who logged each entry, and GPS coordinates are kept private. Public pages only say that GPS was recorded.
Checking it yourself
Each plant's page shows its latest fingerprint under "How this is checked". Moana Plantation Group keeps a full backup of the ledger every night, and every chain in a backup can be checked again offline with the same method.