Patent Issued for Distributed ledger for device management (USPTO 11392947): United Services Automobile Association

2022 AUG 08 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- From Alexandria, Virginia, NewsRx journalists report that a patent by the inventors Buckingham, Thomas Bret (Fair Oaks Ranch, TX, US), Liang, Minya (Redmond, WA, US), Lyle, Ruthie D. (Durham, NC, US), Prasad, Bharat (San Antonio, TX, US), filed on February 26, 2018, was published online on July 19, 2022.

The patent’s assignee for patent number 11392947 is United Services Automobile Association (San Antonio, Texas, United States).

News editors obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “There has been a dramatic increase in the number of appliances, devices, utility devices, mechanisms, lighting fixtures, security devices, and/or other types of devices that are available for the home or other environments, and that include data collection, computing, sensing, and/or network communication capabilities in addition to their normal functionality. These devices may be described as smart appliances, smart vehicles, smart building components, smart infrastructure components, and so forth, and may also be described as Internet of Things (IoT) devices. The various devices may generate data, such as sensor data, status information, and so forth, and the data may be shared among the devices over one or more wired or wireless networks using a variety of communication protocols to provide an IoT platform. In some instances, the devices may be sensed and controlled remotely over one or more networks, and the data generated by the devices may be collected, analyzed, or otherwise processed by computing devices, analytic cloud based IoT platforms and/or individuals.”

As a supplement to the background information on this patent, NewsRx correspondents also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “Identity management generally involves identifying individuals in a system (such as a country, a network, or an enterprise) and controlling access to resources within that system by associating user rights and restrictions with the established identity. In addition, reputation management is the practice of attempting to shape public perception of a person or organization by influencing online information about that entity. In blockchain environments, such as BitCoin, anyone can claim ownership of an address by signing a message that includes the address. For example, a person can register an address with BitCoin and use that address for sending or receiving money. The address can also be used to sign messages. Thus, the “identity verification” currently performed in blockchain environments may only prove that an individual has access to an address, and may not actually verify the identity of the individual using the address. BitCoin and other blockchain environments currently do not have any trusted method of associating an identity with an address

“Embodiments of the present disclosure are generally directed to secure device management. More particularly, embodiments of the present disclosure are directed to managing a network of IoT devices using information and/or computer programming code on a distributed ledger system such as a blockchain. The computer programming code may include smart contracts, which may also be described as self-executing contracts, blockchain contracts, digital contracts, and/or chain code. As used herein, a smart contract refers to computer programming code executed by a distributed ledger system.

“In general, certain embodiments of the present disclosure may be embodied in a method that includes the following actions: receiving, by a smart contract, a request for a user device to issue a command to an IoT device; accessing, by the smart contract, permission information stored on a distributed ledger, the permission information indicating at least one user authorized to interact with the IoT device; and determining, by the smart contract, that the user device is permitted to issue the command to the IoT device, based at least in part on the permission information indicating that an authenticated user of the user device is authorized to interact with the IoT device and, in response, sending the command from the user device to the IoT device through the smart contract.

“In addition, certain embodiments of the present disclosure may be embodied in methods that include acts providing access to a decentralized identity management system to a user. In certain embodiments, the methods include the act of storing user identity information on the decentralized identity management system. The methods also include the act of enabling one or more other users to store reputation information associated with the user identity. The methods also include the act of using the reputation information in a transaction with the user.

“Certain embodiments of the present disclosure include corresponding systems, apparatus, and computer programs that are configured to perform the actions of the methods, encoded on computer storage devices. The present disclosure also provides a computer-readable storage medium coupled to one or more processors and having instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations in accordance with embodiments of the methods provided herein. The present disclosure further provides a system for implementing the methods provided herein. The system includes one or more processors, and a computer-readable storage medium coupled to the one or more processors having instructions stored thereon which, when executed by the one or more processors, cause the one or more processors to perform operations in accordance with embodiments of the methods provided herein.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A method comprising: receiving, by a smart contract executed by at least one processor, a request for a user device to issue a first command to an Internet of Things (IoT) device; accessing, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, permission information stored on a distributed ledger, the permission information indicating at least one user authorized to interact with the IoT device, wherein the permission information stored on the distributed ledger indicates at least one constraint on interaction with the IoT device; determining, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device, based at least in part on the permission information indicating that an authenticated user of the user device is authorized to interact with the IoT device governed by the at least one constraint; transmitting, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, a second command to the IoT device to enable transmission of the first command from the user device to the IoT device upon determination that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device; sending, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, a notification to the user device that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device; receiving, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, a request from the IoT device to transmit a message to an external service, wherein the IoT device and the external service utilize different communication protocols; determining, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, that the IoT device is permitted to transmit the message to the external service based at least in part on the permission information indicating that the IoT device is authorized to interact with the external service, wherein the permission information comprises whether the IoT device is authorized to transmit a type of the message to the external service, wherein the type of the message indicates a content type of the message; and transmitting, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, a third command to the IoT device to enable the IoT device to transmit the message from the IoT device to the external service across the different communication protocols upon determination that the IoT device is authorized to transmit the type of the message to the external service.

“2. The method of claim 1, wherein the smart contract transmits the first command to the IoT device.

“3. The method of claim 2, comprising: receiving, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, a result of the first command sent to the IoT device; and sending, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, the result to be presented through the user device.

“4. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device is based on determining that a context of the first command satisfies the at least one constraint.

“5. The method of claim 4, wherein the at least one constraint includes a distance constraint that the first command is received while the user device is within a threshold distance of the IoT device, the threshold distance specified by the distance constraint.

“6. The method of claim 5, comprising: receiving, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, location information indicating a location of the user device; and determining, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, that the location is within the threshold distance of the IoT device.

“7. The method of claim 4, wherein the at least one constraint includes a time period constraint that the first command is received from the user device during a particular time period specified by the time period constraint.

“8. The method of claim 4, wherein the at least one constraint includes a count constraint that the user device is permitted to send a particular number of commands to the IoT device, the particular number of commands specified by the count constraint.

“9. The method of claim 4, wherein the at least one constraint includes a command type constraint that the first command is a particular command or particular type of command.

“10. The method of claim 1, wherein the smart contract transmits the message to the external service.

“11. The method of claim 10, wherein the message is a transaction initiated by the smart contract using financial information stored on the distributed ledger.

“12. The method of claim 1, wherein the distributed ledger is a blockchain.

“13. The method of claim 1, wherein the user device is a portable computing device.

“14. The method of claim 1, comprising: receiving, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, a permission setting indicating that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device; and updating, by the smart contract executed by the at least one processor, the permission information to include the permission setting.

“15. The method of claim 14, wherein the permission setting indicates at least one constraint on interactions between the user device and the IoT device.

“16. The method of claim 1, wherein the smart contract is configured to execute on the distributed ledger.

“17. The method of claim 1, wherein determining that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device is based on authenticating the user of the user device.

“18. The method of claim 17, wherein authenticating the user of the user device employs at least one biometric authentication mode.

“19. The method of claim 17, wherein authenticating the user of the user device is based on at least one credential provided by the user.

“20. A system comprising: at least one processor; and a memory communicatively coupled to the at least one processor, the memory storing instructions which, when executed, cause the at least one processor to perform operations comprising: receiving, by a smart contract, a request for a user device to issue a first command to an Internet of Things (IoT) device; accessing, by the smart contract, permission information stored on a distributed ledger, the permission information indicating at least one user authorized to interact with the IoT device, wherein the permission information stored on the distributed ledger indicates at least one constraint on interaction with the IoT device; determining, by the smart contract, that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device, based at least in part on the permission information indicating that an authenticated user of the user device is authorized to interact with the IoT device governed by the at least one constraint; transmitting, by the smart contract, a second command to the IoT device to enable transmission of the first command from the user device to the IoT device upon determination that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device; sending, by the smart contract, a notification to the user device that the user device is permitted to issue the first command to the IoT device; receiving, by the smart contract, a request from the IoT device to transmit a message to an external service, wherein the IoT device and the external service utilize different communication protocols; determining, by the smart contract, that the IoT device is permitted to transmit the message to the external service based at least in part on the permission information indicating that the IoT device is authorized to interact with the external service, wherein the permission information comprises whether the IoT device is authorized to transmit a type of the message to the external service, wherein the type of the message indicates a content type of the message; and transmitting, by the smart contract, a third command to the IoT device to enable the IoT device to transmit the message from the IoT device to the external service across the different communication protocols upon determination that the IoT device is authorized to transmit the type of the message to the external service.”

There are additional claims. Please visit full patent to read further.

For additional information on this patent, see: Buckingham, Thomas Bret. Distributed ledger for device management. U.S. Patent Number 11392947, filed February 26, 2018, and published online on July 19, 2022. Patent URL: http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO1&Sect2=HITOFF&d=PALL&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsrchnum.htm&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=11392947.PN.&OS=PN/11392947RS=PN/11392947

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