Bank of America Patents Blockchain security tools

By Raghav Sawhney

With all the hype surrounding blockchain and all the different countries trying to one-up each other, it comes as no surprise that America has just revealed their ‘Trump’ card. Bank of America has won a patent for a way to control access to certain aspects of a permission blockchain network, according to newly published documents.

The patent has been acquired for a non-threateningly titled “system for managing security and access to resource sub-components”. It explains how security tokens (essentially electronic keys, distinct from blockchain-based assets that mimic physical securities) would enable certain users to access information contained in a part.

The bank secured the patent on May 22, according to the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). The bank has filed many blockchain-related applications in recent years and this represents the latest intellectual property development for the bank.

The focus on security and data privacy is quite obvious given the sensitivity of the information that Bank of America might look to transmit across the networks. And, as Bank of America itself notes in the patent document, “with the advent of distributed/decentralized blockchain networks … a need exists to develop systems … that manage control over blocks of resources.”

The bank further says

“A need exists to provide designated entities/users the ability to readily identify blocks that are relevant to the designated users’ concern and, once blocks have been identified, security features that assure that the designated entities/user that are accessing the blocks are, in fact, authorized users.”

The text clarifies that the automated features would have the ability to grant access to the blockchain network for designated periods of time, depending on the scope of a user’s reason for plugging in.