From Food to Bank Notes, Traceability is now a must-have in all Industries

ABSTRACT:
Traceability is no longer a luxury: no business will be durable without it. This need covers all industries. Let's have a look.

ARTICLE TEXT:
Long gone are the days when customers were satisfied with the front-end of a product or a service. From final clients to supervisory bodies, all are now demanding insight and visibility as to the inner works. Australian bank Westpac is only the latest victim of a trend which is here to stay. On all markets within the Western world, traceability is no longer a luxury: no business will be durable without it.

Boeing sinking deeper into trouble

As if one quagmire wasn’t enough, aircraft manufacturer Boeing is headed for yet another storm, even before being finished dealing with the past one. In recent months, the US leader in aeronautics has been bogged down in various investigations, in the wake of two fatal crashes linked to the faulty design of their flight computers. But that was software. Now, Boeing is going to have to deal with traceability issues plaguing safety equipment on its flights. A whistleblower from within Boeing informed the FAA that traceability of oxygen suppliers, designed to keep occupants of a flight alive in the case of cabin depressurization, was faulty, and that as many as a quarter had failed to activate properly during testing. BBC Theo Leggett reports: “On the matter of parts being lost, in early 2017 a review by the Federal Aviation Administration upheld Mr Barnett's concerns, establishing that the location of at least 53 "non-conforming" parts was unknown, and that they were considered lost. Boeing was ordered to take remedial action. Since then, the company says, it has "fully resolved the FAA's findings with regard to part traceability, and implemented corrective actions to prevent recurrence". It has made no further comment about the possibility of non-conforming parts making it on to completed aircraft - although insiders at the North Charleston plant insist it could not happen.” Boeing was unable to certify whether the parts used were original and certified, or scrapped, or counterfeit. The scandal will, no doubt, put another chip in Boeing airline security reputation and will surely lead the FAA to investigate traceability in other areas of the airplane.

Traceability applies, even in the digital world

Demands for accountability and traceability is now everywhere, and is even impacting products whose very design was precisely to avoid it. Messaging service WhatsApp, now belonging to Facebook, built its success largely on its encrypted communication. But the green app, like its competitors, has been taking increasing fire from authorities for the part they involuntarily play. Law enforcement agencies and governments are more and more demanding traceability from social media and requesting their transparence, namely in criminal affairs and misinformation campaigns. If a smartphone is infected, it can be used, without the knowledge of the owner, to spread lies and misinformation - and police cannot find the source, due to Whatsapp’s encryption methods and lack of traceability. Tech expert Surabhi Agarwal covered, in November in 2019, the stonewalled investigation from the Indian government, which blamed Whatsapp for its failure to provide a digital trail. Interviewing a law enforcement official, he reported: “It means anyone can now hack into a device, take control of it and use it to spread malicious rumours that are detrimental to national security or those that lead to incidents of lynching, the official said. “This is precisely why we need to know where a particular message which is leading to unrest has originated from,” the official said, although clarifying that the government was not asking WhatsApp to break its end-to-end encryption feature, but only reveal the origin of a message that has been flagged by law enforcement agencies.” Despite repeated demands, from numerous governments, neither Whatsapp, nor Apple, nor any other tech company have complied with traceability standards until now.

The banknote market is leading the way

Banknote printers are a highly sensitive area, and central banks are terrified at the idea that their currency could be compromised, or their names tarnished. Few printers operate on the market, and not all of them have requested to be certified - some consider their reputation to be enough to uphold the trust they need to conduct operations. Or course, it was only a matter of time before a scandal broke out. In 2016, in the midst of a Liberian contract to replace banknotes, a Liberian newspaper reported, with much credible detail, that kick-backs took place (effectively bloating the cost to the taxpayer and pocketing the difference) and the old banknotes, which should have been removed from the markets, somehow were mysteriously lost. “In order for the first batch of money to be printed, the lawmakers received bribe at the T5 Academy located in Nezoe, operated by Thomas Fallah, representative of Montserrado’s fifth district, a member of the ruling Congress for Democratic Change” investigative reporter Philipbert Browne revealed. Unsurprisingly, banknote printers which have accepted the difficult and expensive path of certification have not been plagued with such scandals. French competitor Oberthur has walked the tedious walk of certification (a demanding process, which most of its competitors opt out of, preferring the cheaper, but lower-quality, process of self-certification), which requires extensive documentation of each operation and transaction, with external auditors monitoring each process. German company Leonhard Kurz, providing security foils to the banknote industry for more than 30 years, is following the same virtuous path, which is essential to maintain his impeccable track record - something worth its weight in gold when operating with central banks.

The rising demand for traceability is now everywhere, and re-sellers are now expected to give insight as to the way the product was made, or the service was provided. Be it electronics or clothing, banknotes or meat, customers and authorities have moved traceability from the “nice-to-have” to the “must-have” category. Any company which ignores this new reality is on thin ice and is just waiting for disaster to happen, if it hasn’t already.