Tokenising judicial system unavailability: A blockchain-based mechanism for verifiable certificates and tamper-evident auditability

Abstract

The availability of judicial information systems is a precondition for procedural continuity and reliable access to digital justice, yet the security and integrity of unavailability records remain underaddressed. In practice, unavailability events are handled through institution-centric administrative procedures that rely on trust and provide limited support for independent verification and retrospective auditability. This paper examines whether the Unavailability of Judicial Information Systems (UJIS) process is a suitable candidate for blockchain-based tokenisation and reports the design, implementation, and evaluation of an operational solution. Using the Process Tokenisation Model for the Public Sector, the UJIS process was assessed through stakeholder interviews and regulatory/document analysis, confirming suitability in terms of process requirements, blockchain capabilities, sustainable incentives, and expected outcomes. Based on this assessment, we designed and implemented a permissioned blockchain solution using Hyperledger Fabric, Node.js smart contracts, and PHP/Laravel interfaces to record and verify unavailability events and to generate digitally signed certificates linked to immutable on-chain records. Verification relies on cryptographic hashes and QR-code deep links, enabling third parties to validate integrity and provenance against a tamper-evident record under permissioned governance, without contacting the issuing department. A Hyperledger Caliper benchmark indicates throughput well above historical demand with sub-second write latency, and integrity verification tests confirm reliable tamper detection through cryptographic hash comparison. Overall, the results show that assessment-driven tokenisation yields a technically feasible mechanism that strengthens transparency, auditability, and cryptographic assurance for managing judicial system unavailability, contributing to the information security of judicial digital infrastructures within the trust assumptions of a permissioned network.

The authors' abstract, as published at the source. Journal of Information Security and Applications, 2026 · DOI ↗