Singapore has partnered with Shenzhen to trial the first cross-border data validation platform linking China and Singapore, marking a significant advancement in future digital infrastructure cooperation between the Greater Bay Area and ASEAN nations.
Accredify said in a statement statement on Wednesday, the Singapore-Shenzhen Cross-Border Data Validation Platform, announced at the 15th Singapore-Guangdong Cooperation Council meeting, is now in trial operations.
The platform addresses compliance, security and trust issues in cross-border data transmission by enabling user-initiated data transmission and platform-based hash verification.
The platform represents a collaboration between Accredify (as the operator on Singapore’s end) and China (Qianhai) Internet Exchange (as the operator on Shenzhen’s end), with WeBank, the first digital bank in China, providing overall architecture design and technical support.
The initiative is supported by Enterprise Singapore, Authority of Qianhai Shenzhen-Hong Kong Modern Service Industry Cooperation Zone, and Commerce Bureau of Shenzhen Municipality.
“This platform provides a replicable model for digital cooperation between the Greater Bay Area and ASEAN countries,
“It enables a credible approach to validate the authenticity of the documents presented by the users across borders while facilitating compliant cross-border data transfers,” said Quah Zheng Wei, Chief Executive Officer of Accredify.
Under the guidance of Shenzhen Branch of the People’s Bank of China and with support from various levels of the government, the trial operations focus on cross-border financial services use case, with Baihang Credit enabling cross-border verification of business owners’ personal credit reports.
This capability directly addresses a common pain point for businesses expanding across the China-Singapore corridor: the difficulty of establishing creditworthiness in new markets.
The platform is built on open-source blockchain technology FISCO BCOS and Distributed Data Transmission Protocol (DDTP).
Leveraging on immutability and traceability features of blockchain technology, the platform enables trusted validation of user-carried data through hash verification.
Based on the right to data portability, users download their information from data providers and independently transmit the information to data recipients, authorizing the specific scope and purpose of data usage.
The platform itself does not transmit or store any original data from the users but allows trusted validation of individual and corporate data through verification of the hashes.
By separating data transmission by the users and hash verification, this approach ensures secure and efficient data portability in compliance with regulatory requirements.
It is noted that the cross-border data verification model has demonstrated success in the Greater Bay Area.
The Shenzhen-Hong Kong Cross-boundary Data Verification Platform has processed over 2,300 transactions since launch, connecting 19 institutions across 11 use cases.
It has facilitated efficient access to loan services for Hong Kong residents in Shenzhen, enabled over HK$100 million ($12.82 million) in financing for Hong Kong affiliates of mainland small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and effectively reduced verification time of admission letters issued by Hong Kong universities—these letters are used as cross-boundary remittance proof for Mainland students who need to pay Hong Kong universities’ tuition fees.
According to the statement, future phases will expand the platform beyond financial services to include additional verifiable data sources and use cases, deepening data connectivity between Singapore and Shenzhen.
This platform is the first operational digital infrastructure for data flow between Singapore and Guangdong, providing replicable practical experience for future digital cooperation between the Greater Bay Area and ASEAN countries.
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