Patent Application
20180365688
This application generally relates to managing transaction commitment, and more particularly, to transaction execution and validation in a blockchain.
A blockchain may be used as a public ledger to store any type of information. Although, primarily used for financial transactions, a blockchain can store any type of information including assets (i.e., products, packages, services, status, etc.). A blockchain may be used to securely store any type of information in its immutable ledger. Decentralized consensus is different from the traditional centralized consensus, such as when one central database used to rule transaction validity. A decentralized scheme transfers authority and trusts to a decentralized network and enables its nodes to continuously and sequentially record their transactions on a public “block,” creating a unique “chain” referred to as a blockchain. Cryptography, via hash codes, is used to secure the authentication of the transaction source and removes the need for a central intermediary.
Except for the real-time transactions supported by most of the smart contracts on different instances of blockchain, committed transactions are increasingly used in the financial industry. Examples of committed transactions which are likely to become increasingly popular may include the settlement of debts, settlement of guarantees, installment loans/payments, loans, interpersonal lending, etc. ‘Net D’ is one of the commonly used conventions in the international trade community, for example, the notation “net 30” indicates that full payment is expected within 30 days. Any commonly used or widely accepted convention for financial service management may need to be adapted to a blockchain infrastructure.
One example method of operation may include one or more of identifying a potential transaction during a transaction commitment procedure, retrieving committed transactions associated with an account, determining a priority associated with the potential transaction, determining a priority of data associated with the committed transactions, comparing the priority associated with the potential transaction with the priority of data associated with the committed transactions, and determining whether to commit the potential transaction in a blockchain or reject the potential transaction.
Another example embodiment may include an apparatus that includes a processor configured to perform one or more of identify a potential transaction during a transaction commitment procedure, retrieve committed transactions associated with an account, determine a priority associated with the potential transaction, determine a priority of data associated with the committed transactions, compare the priority associated with the potential transaction with the priority of data associated with the committed transactions, and determine whether to commit the potential transaction in a blockchain or reject the potential transaction.
Still another example embodiment may include a non-transitory computer readable storage medium configured to store instructions that when executed cause a processor to perform one or more of identifying a potential transaction during a transaction commitment procedure, retrieving committed transactions associated with an account, determining a priority associated with the potential transaction, determining a priority of data associated with the committed transactions, comparing the priority associated with the potential transaction with the priority of data associated with the committed transactions, and determining whether to commit the potential transaction in a blockchain or reject the potential transaction.
It will be readily understood that the instant components, as generally described and illustrated in the figures herein, may be arranged and designed in a wide variety of different configurations. Thus, the following detailed description of the embodiments of at least one of a method, apparatus, non-transitory computer readable medium and system, as represented in the attached figures, is not intended to limit the scope of the application as claimed, but is merely representative of selected embodiments.
The instant features, structures, or characteristics as described throughout this specification may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments. For example, the usage of the phrases “example embodiments”, “some embodiments”, or other similar language, throughout this specification refers to the fact that a particular feature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with the embodiment may be included in at least one embodiment. Thus, appearances of the phrases “example embodiments”, “in some embodiments”, “in other embodiments”, or other similar language, throughout this specification do not necessarily all refer to the same group of embodiments, and the described features, structures, or characteristics may be combined in any suitable manner in one or more embodiments.
In addition, while the term “message” may have been used in the description of embodiments, the application may be applied to many types of network data, such as, packet, frame, datagram, etc. The term “message” also includes packet, frame, datagram, and any equivalents thereof. Furthermore, while certain types of messages and signaling may be depicted in exemplary embodiments they are not limited to a certain type of message, and the application is not limited to a certain type of signaling.
The instant application in one embodiment relates to managing transaction commitment in a trust ledger, and in another embodiment relates to identifying new transactions and comparing the transactions to known transaction data to determine whether to commit the new transactions.
Example embodiments provide user account information being stored, organized, and accessed in a blockchain. Also, the account may be stopped or ‘frozen’ via an account update process which may include a new transaction which is attempting to be committed to the blockchain and which is not valid. In the event that the transaction is validated properly, the transaction may be committed to the blockchain and reflected in the user account information. In general, committed transactions are legal when there are signatures, or stamps on the contracts which enable the laws to be upheld. The blockchain permits an offline signing and stamping process to digital contracts including digital signatures which provide the necessary evidence to uphold certain contracts. In the event that there is a questionable or invalid account, the account may be frozen because one can authorize a transaction from his/her account. In one example, a user A may need to pay another user B $100. Today, user A has $200 coming into their account, but the money was transferred out immediately without executing the planned payment of $100 to user B. In this scenario, the second transfer will not be processed by the blockchain system since the $100 in user A's account is frozen for user B. In order to freeze one's account efficiently, especially when there are multiple types of committed transactions with different expiration times or other conditions, may provide certain later committed transactions which have an earlier planned payment date regardless of a current user account balance.
In a financial example, the total amount of payments/debts can be easily identified for each relative time frame. In this example, the first payment 184 is for a particular time frame while other payments 186 and 188 are identified for a different time period. The tree structure provides a way to calculate a total amount of debt before a particular point in time or amount of time (i.e., day). The nodes in the tree may not require referencing since they may be before the designated date and may be of no interest to the calculation procedure for the current payment plan process.
According to example embodiments, a new monetary transaction may be identified and a set queried priority of the transaction may be the lowest among all the expired but un-executed committed transactions. Using the date as an example, the priority may be set to be the current day (i.e., today). The tree configuration enables a quick retrieval of the amount that should be paid before today from the sum tree by a binary search operation. If the result is that account balance < the unpaid amount, then this current monetary transaction may be refused. If the account balance >= the unpaid amount then the monetary transaction may be accepted if other verification succeeds.
In another example, a new payment to a committed transaction is identified and the queried priority is set to be the priority that was specified in the committed transaction, which is referred to by the new payment transaction. The amount of planned payments which have higher priority over the requested payment may be the basis for the new payment transaction. Those payments are identified and if an unpaid amount with a higher priority > the account balance after the new payment, then this new monetary transaction may be refused. If the unpaid amount with a higher priority <= the account balance after the new payment then the monetary transaction may be accepted if other verification measures succeed. A tree structure storage of the planned payments may include the non-leaf nodes branching by payment priority where the planned payment date is one example of a priority metric. The sum of the amount at each non-leaf node may be stored. A quick verification process of a miner node could provide a verification logic that could “freeze” an account from performing the top prioritized transaction, which mimics the “freezing” behavior of the centralized financial system without knowing the private key of a malicious user. The verification logic may provide retrieving the queried priority, searching the amount of the unpaid amount which has higher priority over the requested transaction and refusing or accepting the current requested transaction.
In one embodiment, the first component, the second component and the third component may be separate devices such as servers, computers or other computational devices or may be a single device. In other embodiments, the first component and the second component may be enclosed as, or perform as, a single device, the first component and the third component may be enclosed as, or perform as, a single device, and the second component and the third component may be enclosed as, or perform as, a single device. The components or devices 310, 320 and 330 may be directly connected or communicably coupled to one another, in a wired or wireless manner, and may reside locally and/or remotely.
The method may further include determining an amount associated with the potential transaction, and determining the data associated with the committed transactions. The method may also include identifying a script associated with the potential transaction, wherein the script comprises one or more of a planned payment amount, a planned payment date, an origination account, a destination account, payment conditions, and a private key verified by contracting parties to the potential transaction, identifying the data as one or more planned payments, identifying priorities and debt amounts of the planned payments, comparing the priority and debt amount associated with the potential transaction to the priorities and debt amounts of the planned payments, and responsive to the comparing, determining whether to commit the potential transaction in the blockchain or reject the potential transaction. The method may further provide retrieving a priority tree data structure from the blockchain, and identifying the planned payments from the priority tree structure. The priority associated with the potential transaction may include a date that is used to identify the priority among other attributes. The method may also include identifying a planned payment list associated with the data, verifying signatures on all planned payments in the planned payment list, identifying one or more unprocessed planned payments, and verifying a guarantee account is linked to the unprocessed planned payments.
As transactions are committed, the content of those transactions is stored in the blockchain and may be retrieved to identify spending habits of a consumer. The pending transaction may be kept pending until a priority can be assigned to the previous transactions and the current pending transaction. For example, if the previous transactions demonstrate a consumer has readily paid their car payment and mortgage payments but is otherwise delinquent on various other payments, then the content of the potential transaction may be identified and compared to the committed transactions to identify a currently assigned priority of the potential transaction which can then be used to determine whether the consumer is likely to pay their debts including the present potential transaction.
The above embodiments may be implemented in hardware, in a computer program executed by a processor, in firmware, or in a combination of the above. A computer program may be embodied on a computer readable medium, such as a storage medium. For example, a computer program may reside in random access memory (“RAM”), flash memory, read-only memory (“ROM”), erasable programmable read-only memory (“EPROM”), electrically erasable programmable read-only memory (“EEPROM”), registers, hard disk, a removable disk, a compact disk read-only memory (“CD-ROM”), or any other form of storage medium known in the art.
An exemplary storage medium may be coupled to the processor such that the processor may read information from, and write information to, the storage medium. In the alternative, the storage medium may be integral to the processor. The processor and the storage medium may reside in an application specific integrated circuit (“ASIC”). In the alternative, the processor and the storage medium may reside as discrete components. For example,
As illustrated in
Although an exemplary embodiment of at least one of a system, method, and non-transitory computer readable medium has been illustrated in the accompanied drawings and described in the foregoing detailed description, it will be understood that the application is not limited to the embodiments disclosed, but is capable of numerous rearrangements, modifications, and substitutions as set forth and defined by the following claims. For example, the capabilities of the system of the various figures can be performed by one or more of the modules or components described herein or in a distributed architecture and may include a transmitter, receiver or pair of both. For example, all or part of the functionality performed by the individual modules, may be performed by one or more of these modules. Further, the functionality described herein may be performed at various times and in relation to various events, internal or external to the modules or components. Also, the information sent between various modules can be sent between the modules via at least one of: a data network, the Internet, a voice network, an Internet Protocol network, a wireless device, a wired device and/or via plurality of protocols. Also, the messages sent or received by any of the modules may be sent or received directly and/or via one or more of the other modules.
One skilled in the art will appreciate that a “system” could be embodied as a personal computer, a server, a console, a personal digital assistant (PDA), a cell phone, a tablet computing device, a smartphone or any other suitable computing device, or combination of devices. Presenting the above-described functions as being performed by a “system” is not intended to limit the scope of the present application in any way, but is intended to provide one example of many embodiments. Indeed, methods, systems and apparatuses disclosed herein may be implemented in localized and distributed forms consistent with computing technology.
It should be noted that some of the system features described in this specification have been presented as modules, in order to more particularly emphasize their implementation independence. For example, a module may be implemented as a hardware circuit comprising custom very large scale integration (VLSI) circuits or gate arrays, off-the-shelf semiconductors such as logic chips, transistors, or other discrete components. A module may also be implemented in programmable hardware devices such as field programmable gate arrays, programmable array logic, programmable logic devices, graphics processing units, or the like.
A module may also be at least partially implemented in software for execution by various types of processors. An identified unit of executable code may, for instance, comprise one or more physical or logical blocks of computer instructions that may, for instance, be organized as an object, procedure, or function. Nevertheless, the executables of an identified module need not be physically located together, but may comprise disparate instructions stored in different locations which, when joined logically together, comprise the module and achieve the stated purpose for the module. Further, modules may be stored on a computer-readable medium, which may be, for instance, a hard disk drive, flash device, random access memory (RAM), tape, or any other such medium used to store data.
Indeed, a module of executable code could be a single instruction, or many instructions, and may even be distributed over several different code segments, among different programs, and across several memory devices. Similarly, operational data may be identified and illustrated herein within modules, and may be embodied in any suitable form and organized within any suitable type of data structure. The operational data may be collected as a single data set, or may be distributed over different locations including over different storage devices, and may exist, at least partially, merely as electronic signals on a system or network.
It will be readily understood that the components of the application, as generally described and illustrated in the figures herein, may be arranged and designed in a wide variety of different configurations. Thus, the detailed description of the embodiments is not intended to limit the scope of the application as claimed, but is merely representative of selected embodiments of the application.
One having ordinary skill in the art will readily understand that the above may be practiced with steps in a different order, and/or with hardware elements in configurations that are different than those which are disclosed. Therefore, although the application has been described based upon these preferred embodiments, it would be apparent to those of skill in the art that certain modifications, variations, and alternative constructions would be apparent.
While preferred embodiments of the present application have been described, it is to be understood that the embodiments described are illustrative only and the scope of the application is to be defined solely by the appended claims when considered with a full range of equivalents and modifications (e.g., protocols, hardware devices, software platforms etc.) thereto.
