A computer implemented method for validating use of a computing resource by a requester software component including: validating a characteristic of the requester; generating a first transaction defining criteria for consumption of the resource by the requester, the first transaction being encrypted with a private key from a public key/private key pair and being added as part of a block of transactions to a blockchain data structure; generating a subsequent encrypted transaction corresponding to a request of the requester to consume the resource, the subsequent transaction referring to the first transaction, wherein the subsequent transaction is validated by a transaction miner computing component from a plurality of miners by authenticating the transaction using the public key and verifying compliance with the criteria defined in each transaction.