Which term best describes a distributed public record of transactions that underpins blockchains?

Which term best describes a distributed public record of transactions that underpins blockchains?

• A. open public ledger
• B. Blockchain
• C. Hash chain
• D. Merkle Tree

Answer: (A)

Think of the system as a distributed public ledger—a record of transactions that is duplicated across many participants and kept in sync through consensus so everyone shares the same view of what happened. This ledger is the foundation that blockchains rely on; a blockchain is one way to implement that ledger by organizing records into blocks and linking them cryptographically. The other terms describe parts of the system rather than the whole record: a hash chain focuses on tying data together with cryptographic hashes, and a Merkle Tree is a data structure inside blocks used to efficiently verify many transactions. The open public ledger phrase best captures the idea of a transparent, distributed record of transactions underlying blockchains.

Think of the system as a distributed public ledger—a record of transactions that is duplicated across many participants and kept in sync through consensus so everyone shares the same view of what happened. This ledger is the foundation that blockchains rely on; a blockchain is one way to implement that ledger by organizing records into blocks and linking them cryptographically. The other terms describe parts of the system rather than the whole record: a hash chain focuses on tying data together with cryptographic hashes, and a Merkle Tree is a data structure inside blocks used to efficiently verify many transactions. The open public ledger phrase best captures the idea of a transparent, distributed record of transactions underlying blockchains.