What is Hedera Consensus Service and why does Borealis use it?

Hedera Consensus Service (HCS) provides tamper-proof, immutable message records on Hedera Hashgraph. Borealis uses it so neither Borealis nor the agent developer can alter certification records. Any third party can independently verify by querying Hedera mainnet. Two active topics: HCS Audit Topic (0.0.10382960) and HCS Data Topic (0.0.10382961).

AI Trust Glossary · Canonical Definition

Infrastructure

Hedera Consensus Service (HCS)

The Hedera Hashgraph service used to anchor BorealisMark certification records, audit trails, and trust scores on an immutable public ledger.

Borealis Research Team · Updated March 2026 · View all 47 terms

Explanation

HCS provides ordered, timestamped, tamper-proof message records on the Hedera Hashgraph network. Unlike traditional databases, records written to HCS cannot be altered or deleted - not even by Borealis. This creates an independent verification layer that neither party can manipulate.

Why it matters

If certification records were stored only in a Borealis database, trust would require trusting Borealis to be honest. HCS removes that requirement - any party can independently verify a certification by querying Hedera mainnet directly.

How Borealis uses it

Two Hedera topics are active: the HCS Audit Topic (0.0.10382960) for immutable audit trails, and the HCS Data Topic (0.0.10382961) for trust score anchoring. Every certification and telemetry score is anchored with a Hedera transaction ID returned to the API caller. All operations run on Hedera mainnet.