Sia was originally conceived at HackMIT 2013. Sia leverages the capacity of blockchain technology to enable distributed networks to reach consensus in a secure and trust-less way. Cryptographically secured smart contracts ensure the encryption and transfer of data with no possibility for a third party to interfere in any way.
Sia is a new approach to cloud storage platforms. Instead of all data centers being owned and operated by a single company, Sia opens the floodgates and allows anyone to make money by renting out their hard drive. Data integrity is protected using redundancy and cryptography.
The promise of Sia is a decentralized network of data centers that, taken together, comprise the world's fastest, cheapest, and most secure cloud storage platform. The long term goal of Sia is to be the backbone storage layer of the Internet.