Patent Issued for Systems and methods for verifying agent sales data via blockchain (USPTO 11443063): State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company

2022 SEP 29 (NewsRx) -- By a News Reporter-Staff News Editor at Insurance Daily News -- According to news reporting originating from Alexandria, Virginia, by NewsRx journalists, a patent by the inventors Bellas, Eric (Bloomington, IL, US), Breitweiser, Edward W. (Bloomington, IL, US), Call, Shawn M. (Bloomington, IL, US), Chapman, Corin Rebekah (Bloomington, IL, US), Floyd, Burton J. (Mackinaw, IL, US), Gomez, Robert (Bloomington, IL, US), King, Vicki (Bloomington, IL, US), Magerkurth, Melinda Teresa (Utica, IL, US), Moore, Eric R. (Heyworth, IL, US), Olson, Steven T. (Bloomington, IL, US), Skaggs, Jaime (Chenoa, IL, US), Smith, Shelia Cummings (Bloomington, IL, US), Turrentine, David (Normal, IL, US), Wells, Timothy Caleb (Bloomington, IL, US), filed on October 1, 2020, was published online on September 13, 2022.

The assignee for this patent, patent number 11443063, is State Farm Mutual Automobile Insurance Company (Bloomington, Illinois, United States).

Reporters obtained the following quote from the background information supplied by the inventors: “In the world of business an interaction between a business and a customer, or the business and another business, typically requires validation of one or more pieces of information before a transaction can take place. This validation is often achieved by the participants involved in the interaction contacting a central authority that is a trusted source of truth for the particular piece of information. The central authority may then validate, or not validate, the particular piece of information and communicate its findings to the participants. Based upon the validation, or lack of validation, a consensus among the participants is formed and assuming the information is valid the transaction between the participants may take place, and subsequently be recorded.

“Traditionally, businesses, customers, and central authorities have stored information related to transactions, and records of transactions, in databases, or ledgers which have been used in accounting to track transactions and information related to those transactions. Often these databases or ledgers held by the participants must be reconciled to achieve consensus as to the validity of the information stored in the databases and ledgers. Alternatively, as described above the central authority may be responsible for determining the validity of information stored in a database or a ledger and functioning as an arbiter of consensus for interested parties.

“A blockchain is a new way of achieving a distributed consensus on the validity or invalidity of information. As opposed to using a central authority, a blockchain is a distributed database or ledger, in which a transactional record is maintained at each node of a peer to peer network. Commonly, the distributed ledger is comprised of groupings of transactions bundled together into a “block.” When a change to the distributed ledger is made (e.g., when a new transaction and/or block is created), each node must form a consensus as to how the change is integrated into the distributed ledger. Upon consensus, the agreed upon change is pushed out to each node so that each node maintains an identical copy of the updated distributed ledger. Any change that does not achieve a consensus is ignored. Accordingly, unlike a traditional system which uses a central authority, a single party cannot unilaterally alter the distributed ledger. This inability to modify past transactions lead to blockchains being generally described as trusted, secure, and/or immutable.

“Blockchains are typically deployed in an open, decentralized, and permissionless manner meaning that any party may view information, submit new information, or join the blockchain as a node responsible for confirming information. This open, decentralized, and permissionless approach to a blockchain has limitations. As an example, these traditional blockchains may not be good candidates for interactions that require information to be kept private, for interactions that require all participants to be vetted prior to their participation, or for interactions that may only be performed by a subset of all participants.”

In addition to obtaining background information on this patent, NewsRx editors also obtained the inventors’ summary information for this patent: “The present embodiments may be related to blockchain technology, including modifying blocking technology to be able to store confidential and/or personal information in a blockchain and maintain data privacy. The embodiments described herein relate particularly to various aspects of processing a blockchain comprising a plurality of immutable sales records corresponding to sales made by agents an entity. In some embodiments, a transaction request indicating a sale made by an agent is verified, and a block indicating a sales record indicating the sale made by the agent is validated and added to a blockchain.

“In one aspect, a computer-implemented method of processing a blockchain comprising a plurality of immutable sales records corresponding to sales made by agents of an entity may be provided. The blockchain may be maintained by a plurality of nodes connected via a network, each of the plurality of nodes maintaining a respective copy of the blockchain. The method may include: (1) receiving, at a processor of a first node of the plurality of nodes, a transaction request initiated by a source and indicating a sale made by an agent of the entity; (2) verifying the transaction request by verifying an identity of the source; (3) generating, by the processor of the first node, a block to add to the blockchain, the block including a sales record indicating the sale made by the agent of the entity; (4) transmitting, via the network by the processor of the first node, the block to at least a second node of the plurality of nodes; (5) receiving, at the processor of the first node, an indication that the block is validated by one of the plurality of nodes using a cryptographic computation; and/or (6) adding, by the processor of the first node, the block to a copy of the blockchain maintained by the first node, the block identified by a hash value that references a previous block in the blockchain, the previous block including at least one additional sales record indicating at least one additional sale made by at least one agent of the entity. The method may include additional, less, or alternate actions, including those discussed elsewhere herein.

“For instance, verifying the transaction request may include one or more of: (1) accessing a consensus rule associated with the transaction request and shared by the plurality of nodes, the consensus rule indicating a set of authorized sources, and (2) verifying the transaction request based on determining that the source is included in the set of authorized sources; determining, by the processor, that an existing block of the copy of the blockchain maintained by the first node indicates the identity of the source; receiving, via the network from at least a portion of the plurality of nodes, an indication that the transaction request is verified; verifying that the source is in good standing with the entity; authenticating the source of the transaction request using a digital signature associated with the source; determining, based on a permission level of the first node, that the first node has sufficient permission to submit the transaction request; and/or (1) adding the transaction request to a queue of pending transactions, and (2) detecting that at least one of the nodes of the plurality of nodes verified the identity of the source.

“Additionally, transmitting the block to at least the second node of the plurality of nodes may include transmitting, via the network, the block to at least the second node, wherein the second node transmits the block to at least a third node of the plurality of nodes.

“Moreover, the method may further include generating, by the processor of the first node, a public key and a private key for the first node.”

The claims supplied by the inventors are:

“1. A computer-implemented method of processing a blockchain comprising a plurality of immutable sales records corresponding to sales made by agents of an entity, the blockchain maintained by a plurality of nodes connected via a network, each of the plurality of nodes maintaining a respective copy of the blockchain, the method comprising: receiving, at a processor of a first node of the plurality of nodes, a transaction request initiated by a requesting node and indicating a sale made by an agent of the entity; verifying the transaction request by verifying an identity of the requesting node, wherein verifying the identity of the requesting node includes: querying, by the processor of the first node, a permissions database to determine a permission level associated with the requesting node, and determining, based on the permission level, that the requesting node has permission to submit the transaction request; responsive to determining that the requesting node has permission to submit the transaction request, adding a sales record indicating the sale made by the agent of the entity to a new block to add to the blockchain; and transmitting, via the network by the processor of the first node, the new block to at least a second node of the plurality of nodes such that the second node updates a copy of the blockchain stored thereat to include the new block.

“2. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein verifying the transaction request comprises: accessing a consensus rule associated with the transaction request and shared by the plurality of nodes, the consensus rule indicating a set of authorized sources; and verifying the transaction request based on determining that the requesting node is included in the set of authorized sources.

“3. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein verifying the transaction request comprises: determining, by the processor, that an existing block of the copy of the blockchain maintained by the first node indicates the identity of the requesting node.

“4. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein verifying the transaction request comprises: receiving, via the network from at least a portion of the plurality of nodes, an indication that the transaction request is verified.

“5. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein verifying the transaction request comprises: verifying that the requesting node is in good standing with the entity.

“6. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein the transaction request includes a digital signature associated with the source, and wherein verifying the transaction request comprises: authenticating the requesting node using the digital signature.

“7. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein verifying the transaction request comprises: adding the transaction request to a queue of pending transactions; and detecting that at least one of the nodes of the plurality of nodes verified the identity of the source.

“8. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, wherein transmitting the block to at least the second node of the plurality of nodes comprises: transmitting, via the network, the block to at least the second node, wherein the second node transmits the block to at least a third node of the plurality of nodes.

“9. The computer-implemented method of claim 1, further comprising: generating, by the processor of the first node, a public key and a private key for the first node.

“10. A system for processing a blockchain comprising a plurality of immutable sales records corresponding to sales made by agents of an entity, the blockchain maintained by a plurality of nodes connected via a network, the system comprising: a first node of the plurality of nodes, the first node configured to maintain a first copy of the blockchain; a second node of the plurality of nodes, the second node connected to the first node via the network and configured to maintain a second copy of the blockchain; a first processor implemented in the first node and configured to: receive a transaction request initiated by a requesting node and indicating a sale made by an agent of the entity, verify the transaction request by verifying an identity of the requesting node, wherein verifying the identity of the requesting node includes: querying a permissions database to determine a permission level associated with the requesting node, and determining, based on the permission level, that the requesting node has permission to submit the transaction request; responsive to determining that the requesting node has permission to submit the transaction request, add a sales record indicating the sale made by the agent of the entity to a new block to add to the blockchain, and transmit, via the network, the new block to at least the second node, wherein the second node updates the second copy of the blockchain to include the new block.

“11. The system of claim 10, wherein to verify the transaction request, the first processor is configured to: access a consensus rule associated with the transaction request and shared by the plurality of nodes, the consensus rule indicating a set of authorized sources, and verify the transaction request based on determining that the requesting node is included in the set of authorized sources.

“12. The system of claim 10, wherein to verify the transaction request, the first processor is configured to: determine that an existing block of the copy of the blockchain maintained by the first node indicates the identity of the requesting node.

“13. The system of claim 10, wherein to verify the transaction request, the first processor is configured to: receive, via the network from at least a portion of the plurality of nodes, an indication that the transaction request is verified.

“14. The system of claim 10, wherein to verify the transaction request, the first processor is configured to: verify that the requesting node is in good standing with the entity.

“15. The system of claim 10, wherein the transaction request includes a digital signature associated with the source, and wherein to verify the transaction request, the first processor is configured to: authenticate the source of the transaction request using the digital signature.

“16. The system of claim 10, wherein to verify the transaction request, the first processor is configured to: add the transaction request to a queue of pending transactions, and detect that at least one of the nodes of the plurality of nodes verified the identity of the source.

“17. The system of claim 10, wherein to transmit the block to at least the second node of the plurality of nodes, the first processor is configured to: transmit, via the network, the block to at least the second node, wherein the second node transmits the block to at least a third node of the plurality of nodes.

“18. The system of claim 10, wherein the first processor is further configured to: generate a public key and a private key for the first node.”

For more information, see this patent: Bellas, Eric. Systems and methods for verifying agent sales data via blockchain. U.S. Patent Number 11443063, filed October 1, 2020, and published online on September 13, 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=11443063.PN.&OS=PN/11443063RS=PN/11443063

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