IBM Patents Blockchain Based System To Save Players From Dangers Of Augmented Reality Games

By Sumedha Bose

Have you ever walked into a wall while playing a video game on your phone? Or have you ever found one of your legs in a gutter while trying to shoot zombies in a game? Well, if you are a hardcore gamer, then chances are, you have.

Good news for all the gamers, a new system may soon be in the works, that will protect gamers from entering physical spaces that are undesirable. Tech giant IBM has filed recently filed a patent for such a blockchain-based system, that will protect players playing games with augmented reality, from entering unpleasant locations.

Augmented reality is one such technology that adds a layer to any game and makes it look like it is happening in reality. One of the examples is Pokemon Go, which sparked a controversy when there were reports of people getting into accidents while trying to catch Pokemons. The locations that the gamers will be cautioned against include spots like “high-risk locations, culturally sensitive locations, locations marked by property owners.”

Such location based AR games are susceptible to attack vector, which is when “actors or users may maliciously profile a location for different purposes (e.g., misleading game players by falsifying the profile of a location where the ARC can be placed).” IBM seeks to patent a unique technology that will prevent actors from colliding with objects or entering locations that are not desirable.

The blockchain based system is expected to track, store, and maintain location related transactions along with other location metadata. It will use location, labels, or tags using a location/label/tag blockchain-based system.

The data will be growing continuously and it will be stored in a secure manner, without allowing for any tampering.

The system will also include a neural network which will learn the results of interactions in various locations and record the data in the blockchain used.

The process of getting something patented usually takes a while. So we will have to wait for this system to actually make it to the market.