Distributed Ledger Ownership Verification for Secure Device Onboarding
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing device onboarding processes in distributed systems face security challenges due to the potential for ownership vouchers to be stale, inaccurate, or incomplete, which can lead to endpoint devices being compromised during onboarding.
Innovation Solution
The use of distributed ledgers to verify the content of ownership vouchers, ensuring that the information about ownership transfers is up-to-date and accurate, thereby establishing a cryptographically verifiable chain of delegation of authority over endpoint devices back to their roots of trust.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If traditional ownership vouchers are used for device onboarding, then the onboarding process is simple and fast, but the security is compromised because ownership information may be stale or inaccurate
Solution Approach 1:
A distributed ledger acts as an intermediary between the ownership voucher system and the onboarding process. The ledger stores authoritative ownership records that can be cryptographically verified, mediating between the simplicity of voucher-based onboarding and the need for accurate ownership verification. This resolves the contradiction by introducing a trusted intermediate layer that validates ownership without requiring complex manual verification processes.
Solution Approach 2:
Ownership transfers are recorded in advance in the distributed ledger before the onboarding process occurs. This preliminary recording ensures that when a device attempts to onboard, the current ownership state is already established and verifiable, eliminating the staleness problem. The ledger is updated proactively with each ownership change, so verification during onboarding simply reads this pre-established truth.
2Reliability
If distributed ledgers are used to verify ownership vouchers, then security is enhanced by ensuring up-to-date ownership information, but the computational overhead and verification time increase
Solution Approach 1:
The patent replaces traditional mechanical/trust-based verification methods with cryptographic verification. Instead of manually checking ownership chains or relying on trusted intermediaries, the system uses cryptographic signatures and hash verification that can be automatically validated by machines. This substitution reduces verification time while enhancing security, as cryptographic operations are computationally efficient and can be performed automatically without human intervention.
Solution Approach 2:
The distributed ledger creates cryptographic copies of ownership records that can be verified without accessing the original centralized database. Each node holds a copy of the ledger state, allowing parallel verification attempts. This copying mechanism distributes the verification load and enables fast validation through cryptographic proof without requiring centralized coordination, thus reducing verification time while maintaining security.
Data Source
AI summary
Methods and systems for managing endpoint devices are disclosed. The endpoint devices may be managed by verifying ownership vouchers prior to use. To verify the ownership vouchers, certificates from the ownership vouchers may be analyzed to identify alleged owners. Once identified, the alleged owners may be checked against current owners as documented using distributed immutable ledgers, or information derived from the ledgers or entities that would otherwise maintain the ledgers. If the alleged owner is verified to be the current owner, then the corresponding ownership voucher may be used during onboarding.