<p>In 1991 Stuart Haber and W. Scott Stornetta wanted to implement a system where document timestamps could not be tampered with. In 1979 Ralph Merkle patented the concept of hash trees. It is called a hashtree or Merke tree which is a tree in which every leaf node is labelled with the hash of a data block, and every non-leaf node is labelled with the cryptographic hash. A hash helps to protect the security of the transmission against tampering. Hashing is also a method of sorting key values in a database table in an efficient manner.</p>
Blockchain was invented by a person or a group of people to serve as the public transaction ledger of the cryptocurrency bitcoin. They use the name of Satoshi Nakamoto. The identity of this person or group is unknown. It was invented in 2008 and aimed to be a viable alternative to fiat currency. This cryptocrurrency is a secure, decentralized, global currency that could be used as a medium of exchange. In the Satoshi Nakamoto whitepaper he detailed it as an electronic peer-to-peer system.
A blockchain is a chain of digital "blocks" that contains records of transactions. The blockchain is decentralized and not managed by a central authority. A blockchain is actually a database because it is a digital ledger that stores information in data structures called blocks. The blockchain itself is a database but a database is not a blockchain because they differ in design.
The blockchain is used to record transactions across many computers. Business can easily transition to blockchain without the worry of speed or functionality issues. Business applications will also become less vulnerable to hacking.