Blockchain Trusted Ledger for Secure Object Tracking
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
Existing object tracking systems face challenges in determining the most recent observation of an object's location across multiple surveillance systems, particularly in ensuring data privacy and security, and in managing trust among observers.
Innovation Solution
A blockchain-based trusted ledger system that stores the last observed location of a tagged object, allowing only trusted observers to make permanent updates and providing a mechanism for earning trust, enabling backward tracking of an object's location history.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Adaptability or versatility
If a distributed tracking system uses multiple surveillance systems to track objects, then tracking coverage and versatility are improved, but determining the most recent observation becomes difficult and reliability decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The system pre-establishes a hierarchy of observer trust levels and predefined rules for determining most recent observations before tracking begins. This preliminary framework allows the system to automatically resolve conflicts about which observation is most recent without real-time negotiation, ensuring reliable tracking across multiple surveillance systems.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent introduces a centralized coordinator or consensus mechanism that acts as an intermediary between multiple surveillance systems. This intermediary receives observations from various systems, validates them according to predefined trust criteria, and determines the most recent observation, thereby resolving conflicts and ensuring reliability across the distributed tracking network.
2Ease of operation
If location information is stored in a centralized repository, then ease of operation is improved, but data privacy and security are compromised
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the centralized repository into multiple distributed nodes or partitions, each holding a portion of the location information. This segmentation allows the system to maintain ease of operation through coordinated access while improving security and privacy by eliminating a single point of failure and reducing the value of any single compromised node.
Solution Approach 2:
The system implements local quality by allowing different surveillance systems or storage nodes to have different security credentials and access permissions based on their trust levels. This enables the system to maintain operational ease while protecting data privacy and security through differentiated access control, where only trusted observers can access or write to specific portions of the location information.
3Productivity
If all observers are allowed to update location information, then productivity is improved, but reliability and data accuracy deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements dynamic trust validation where observer credentials and permission levels are not static but can change over time based on performance, verification, and system needs. This dynamic approach allows the system to maintain high productivity by accepting updates from multiple observers while ensuring reliability through ongoing validation, where observers can be upgraded or downgraded based on their track record and current system requirements.
Solution Approach 2:
The system incorporates feedback mechanisms where observer updates are validated against predefined criteria, and the system provides feedback to observers about the status of their updates. This feedback loop ensures that only accurate and reliable information is accepted, maintaining data accuracy while still allowing high productivity through automated validation processes that quickly accept legitimate updates without manual review.
Data Source
AI summary
A blockchain function may include one or more of receiving a last observed location identifier for a product identified via a product tag associated with the product, determining whether the last observed location identifier was received from a trusted source device, and storing the last observed location identifier in a blockchain with a confirmed status responsive to determining the last observed location identifier was received from the trusted source device.