General Motors (GM) has applied for a patent related to a blockchain-based system that stores data generated by autonomously driven cars.
The document in question was published last Thursday by the US Patent and Trademark Office and was issued by GM Global Technology Operations LLC.
The system described, in addition to storing data, would allow access to useful information derived from cars.
One of the utilities of the GM system is to facilitate routes by offering information in a dynamic way:
“It is desirable to provide locations information and densities of vehicles in regions in an online blockchain ledger for interoperable information sharing between vehicles of participants for use in navigating routes“.
In addition, the document proposes data sharing between different platforms, thus allowing the blockchain to be shared between municipalities, infrastructure managers, law enforcement and other institutions.
Another idea mentioned in the patent application is to use the blockchain on the vehicles also to pay for services and goods such as parking, fuel or transit on toll highways.
This is not General Motors’ first effort with a view to modernizing the company: in 2019, in fact, they should begin to produce self-driving cars.
Innovations of the near future
The production of self-driving cars is not unprecedented.
Many of the Tesla‘s currently in production are clearly equipped with hardware capable of full autonomy that should become available thanks to a future upgrade.
Ford, on the other hand, has promised an economy car without a steering wheel and pedals for large-scale production by 2021, calling it a new Model T.
The blockchain is likely to play an important role in the future IoT: when everything is smart you need a secure system that preserves privacy and is difficult to compromise.
