Before the US government got its guns out for Kaspersky in March, the US Patent and Trademark Office issued a patent on behalf of Kaspersky for a new data transfer technique that makes use of blockchain technology.

The patent for “Systems and methods for sending user data from a trusted party to a third party using a distributed registry” as the solution is currently known, was granted on 22nd February 2022. The patent document, which can be viewed here, is incredibly detailed so we can’t run over everything here.

The gist of the patent is that Kaspersky has invented a way to transfer data using the blockchain as a way to insure the integrity of that data doesn’t falter. This, Kaspersky says, is relevant for Know Your Customer and Client Due Diligence service providers.

“In an exemplary aspect, a trusted party device may receive a request for user data and a first hash of the request stored in a distributed registry. In response to verifying that the first hash matches a hash of the request as calculated by the trusted party device, the trusted party device may generate and transmit both a confirmation request to send the user data and a second hash of the confirmation request to an authorized user device. The trusted party device may receive, from the authorized user device, both a confirmation message and a third hash of the confirmation message stored in the distributed registry. In response to verifying that the third hash matches a hash of the confirmation message as calculated by the trusted party device, the trusted party device may send the requested user data,” reads an excerpt from the patent.

Having a patent granted is all fine and well but there are many patents that have been granted but there has been no action on these. To that end, Kaspersky says it will continue developing this solution as well as how it can be used in other products.

“Data management technologies are a rapidly emerging worldwide trend and, as a cybersecurity company, we were interested in developing methods that can contribute to the safety of those solutions. While working on the project, we solved this security problem by providing the technical ability to confirm the transfer of data while ensuring the protection of information by not storing it in the blockchain,” says inventor of the solution at Kaspersky, Alexander Sazonov.

More than just the transfer of data, Kaspersky suggests that with some adaptations this technology could be used to confirm that an employee has the authority to sign documents or make changes. This could help to address supply-chain attacks and other attack vectors that leverage data in-transit to commit crimes.

This is a really interesting solution from Kaspersky and one we will be keeping an eye on to see how it progresses and evolves. At the very least we’re glad to see more solutions that leverage blockchain technology and that aren’t just new cryptocurrencies.