IBM Wants To Address Privacy And Security Concerns In Drones: A New Patent

We all know that aside from the rise of cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin and altcoins, there is a rise in another form of technology, known as unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) or drones. In the latest news on our DC Forecasts crypto news site, we are seeing IBM with a new patent application that directly focuses on the increasing usage of drones in both commercial and recreational applications.

According to the documents which went public on Thursday by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), IBM first applied for the patent in March 2017 – with an aim to address privacy and security concerns associated with the increasing usage of drones.

The patent application outlines how a blockchain ledger could be used to store data associated with aerial vehicle (UAV) flights. As IBM noted,  blockchain can help “particularly when a security risk is considered to be relatively high,” ensuring that the airspace controllers and regulators can supervise the increasing number of drones flying in the sky.

The authors of the patent explain in the official document:

“The chain can be considered a chronicle of a UAV’s path through time. When a transaction is conducted, the corresponding UAV parameters are sent to one or more of the computing nodes in the system for validation. The one or more computing nodes establish a validity of the transaction and generate a new block. Once the new block has been calculated, it can be appended to the stakeholder’s UAV blockchain. Among many other advantages, the use of a blockchain infrastructure helps in identifying misbehaving UAVs by multiple parties and such activities are recorded in an immutable ledger. “

As such, the permissioned blockchain by IBM could include different block times that change in response to the environmental triggers. For example, if a recreational drone flies too close to a restricted flight zone, it will trigger a risk flag and notify the network to provide airspace controllers with increased data on the UAV and its operator.