U.S. Patent 10567168 was awarded to INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION on February 18, 2020 and is entitled “Blockchain transaction privacy enhancement through broadcast encryption.” The first named inventor is John B. Geagan, III of San Jose, CA. The abstract contains an overview of the patent disclosure:

An example operation may include one or more of storing a broadcast encryption tree comprising a set of cryptographic keys disposed in a hierarchical tree format, distributing a partial set of keys from the broadcast encryption tree to each respective peer from among a group of peers included in a blockchain network, receiving, from a user device, an identification of at least one peer included in the group of peers for processing a blockchain transaction, selecting a subset of keys from among the set of cryptographic keys in the broadcast encryption tree which enables at least one peer to decrypt transactions and doesn’t enable the remaining peers included in the group of peers to decrypt transactions, and transmitting broadcast encryption information about the selected subset of keys to the user device for performing encryption of the transactions. Link to Full Patent

This blockchain patent was originally filed on November 16, 2017  as U.S. Patent Application 15/814485 at the United Stated Patent and Trademark Office. The application was them awarded a patent grant and published as U.S. Patent 10567168. The primary examiner was Lynn D Feild.

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS MACHINES CORPORATION, who is the original assignee of this patent, has at least 150818 total granted patents in the United States as of the date of this article. This blockchain patent has been cited 0 times by other U.S. patents according to our law firm research, and can be considered an innovative patent in the field of cryptocurrency and blockchain.

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