Data feeds aren’t unique to blockchains; almost all centralised digital applications use API feeds but require some kind of trust-based authentication to confirm data validity.
The most apparent way oracles could verify data would be to replicate the centralised approach to accessing data in the off-chain world, but this immediately challenges the decentralisation nature of blockchains. Even with checks and balances, getting data from one source produces a central point of failure.
A centralised oracle is open to error and downtime
and is a target for anyone that would gain from being
able to manipulate the feed.The more popular alternative to centralised oracles is to use a decentralised oracle network (DON) working from several sources incentivised to provide accurate data.
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