A blockchain, or distributed ledger, is a ledger shared across different computers in a peer-to-peer network (P2P network). Every computer has the same copy of the ledger.

This technology helps track digital assets and operates as software running in computer memory.

For example, consider a transaction ledger. A ledger contains many pages, and each page contains records of several transactions. Each page also has a page number.

The page numbers make it easy to find transaction records. If a page is lost or changed, it can be detected easily.

In this analogy, the ledger is the blockchain, a page in the ledger is a block, and the records on the pages represent transactions.

Because every blockchain participant, or peer, has the same copy of the ledger, blockchain removes the need to depend on a trusted third party, such as a bank or government, to record data.