Blockchain Alert Transactions for Freezing Fraudulent Outpoints
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Solution Overview
Problem
Blockchain networks lack a mechanism to effectively freeze or undo transactions in cases of fraud or theft without requiring a network-wide software change, as they rely on a distributed consensus-based system without a trusted authority.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a method to identify alert transactions, validate signatures, and process instructions such as invalidating blocks, banning peer nodes, freezing transaction outpoints, or propagating confiscation transactions using alert messages signed with administrator public keys.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a distributed consensus-based system is used without a trusted authority, then the system achieves decentralization and eliminates the need for intermediaries, but the system lacks the ability to freeze or undo transactions in cases of fraud or theft
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces an alert administrator as an intermediary entity that can issue signed alerts to freeze or invalidate transactions. This mediator operates within the decentralized system by using cryptographic signatures rather than centralized control, allowing transaction freezing capabilities while maintaining the overall distributed consensus structure. The alert administrator signs alerts with their private key, and nodes validate these alerts using the administrator's public key, enabling secure transaction control without a traditional trusted authority.
2Reliability
If a network-wide software change is implemented to add transaction freezing capability, then the system gains the ability to respond to fraud, but the system complexity and implementation difficulty increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements transaction freezing capability through pre-configured alert administrators whose public keys are already embedded in the node software. When fraud occurs, the alert administrator can immediately issue signed alerts without requiring software updates. The nodes are pre-programmed to recognize and validate these alerts, allowing rapid response to fraud while avoiding the complexity of network-wide software changes. This preliminary configuration enables the system to gain fraud response capability through a simple parameter addition rather than complex system modification.
Data Source
AI summary
Systems and computer-implemented methods for generating, propagating and handling alert messages on a blockchain network. The alert messages may be generated and sent by an alert administration service to instruct mining nodes to take certain actions, including freezing a transaction outpoint, banning a peer node, invalidating a block, or implementing a confiscation transaction to move assets from a transaction outpoint to another address. An alert handler within the node software at the mining nodes manages the parsing and processing of alerts. Alerts may be sent in P2P message that includes a serialized alert transaction that itself includes the alert message in an output field. A processed alert message results in the alert transaction being included in the mempool and, eventually, the blockchain.