DE102018210501A1 - Method and device for processing a payment transaction with a crypto wallet - Google Patents

Abstract

Method (10) for processing a payment transaction (16) with a crypto wallet (20), characterized by the following features: - a position of the wallet (20) is determined (11) by a position determination, - an examination (12) thereupon carried out whether the address (14) has a geographical reference to the location and - depending on the check (12), a release (13) (13) of the payment transaction (16) is optionally given.

Description

The present invention relates to a method for processing a payment transaction with a crypto wallet. The present invention also relates to a corresponding device, a corresponding computer program and a corresponding storage medium.

State of the art

A so-called cryptocurrency wallet stores the public and private keys required to ingest or issue units of a cryptocurrency. Prior art crypto wallets can contain multiple pairs of public and private keys. In the case of the cryptocurrency Bitcoin and its derivatives, on the other hand, the actual cryptocurrency is kept decentrally in a publicly accessible general ledger. Each unit of the cryptocurrency has a private key, which allows the unit to be “issued”, as it were, by completing a payment transaction in this distributed ledger.

So-called hardware wallets (hardware wallets) are known in particular. When the user of such a wallet processes a payment, the actual payment transaction is created using an application programming interface (API) of the wallet. The wallet hardware then signs the transaction and provides a public key, which in turn is sent over the Internet using the API. This way, the signature keys never leave the hardware wallet.

DE102016206916A1 relates to an electronic method for the cryptographically secure transfer of an amount of a cryptocurrency by a transaction of the amount from a starting address assigned to a first client to a destination address assigned to a second client, a plurality of clients being provided, which comprises at least the first and the second client, a wallet program for realizing a client node of the cryptocurrency is installed on the clients, a transaction server is provided on which a transaction program for realizing a server node of the cryptocurrency is installed, the transaction program is configured to generate blocks of the blockchain with transaction data , the transaction server comprises a private and a public server key of an asymmetrical pair of server keys and the transaction server comprises a server certificate of a hierarchical PKI with a central root certification authority, which is configured to serve as proof of the authenticity of the public server key and the authorization of the transaction server to generate blocks of the blockchain.

Disclosure of the invention

The proposed method is based on the knowledge that with cryptocurrencies it is generally possible to generate any number of addresses to which money can be transferred. The character strings of the addresses may appear random at first glance, but they always have a direct connection to a secret key.

The approach described below also takes into account the desire of numerous users to better secure transfers with cryptocurrencies. In particular, it is to be avoided that transfers (e.g. by hackers) are inadvertently smuggled into accounts outside of one's own legal area and that it is very difficult for the money to be won back by legal means. Ideally, it should be possible to check by simple means whether a transfer address is plausible.

Against this background, the invention provides a method for processing a payment transaction with a crypto wallet, a corresponding device, a corresponding computer program and a corresponding storage medium according to the independent claims.

One advantage of this solution lies in its ability to significantly hinder hacking attempts to steal money. So it is not very promising for hackers to shove a fake transfer address to buyers, since the fake transfer addresses have a local reference to the current location of the buyer according to the invention. In order for an attack to succeed, the victim's whereabouts would first have to be determined and a transfer address with the victim's current position would have to be generated in an expensive and lengthy process.

The measures listed in the dependent claims allow advantageous developments and improvements of the basic idea specified in the independent claim. Thus, it can be provided that the address of the payee is generated by repeatedly determining a scatter value of different random numbers and the secret key until it designates the seat (for companies) or place of residence (for natural persons) of the payee in accordance with a predetermined scheme. It may prove profitable for service providers to generate random secret keys in this way and thus random transfer addresses for as long to generate until one of the transfer addresses has valid location information. If the publisher of the address is a trustworthy company, buyers will find for this transfer address and the secret key, who believe the latter that the offered key was actually kept secret and is only accessible to the buyer. It would be much more difficult for this customer to generate a secret key with a suitable local address, because with every attempt the probability of generating an address that does not match his location far outweighs the probability of success. In addition, he will not be able to sell the secret key of an inappropriate location unless he can instill confidence in his ability to actually keep the secret key secret.

According to a further aspect, it can be provided that payment transactions are only released if the address of the payee falls below a predetermined distance from the location of the crypto wallet according to the invention from which the payment is to be made. Large-scale hacker attacks in which a large number of victims around the world are attacked cannot be carried out in this way with the same transfer address. This in turn can reduce the chance of an attack's success by up to 99.99%.

list of figures

• 1 das Flussdiagramm eines Verfahrens gemäß einer ersten Ausführungsform.
• 2 schematisch eine Krypto-Geldbörse gemäß einer zweiten Ausführungsform.

Embodiments of the invention are shown in the drawings and explained in more detail in the following description. It shows:

• 1 the flowchart of a method according to a first embodiment.
• 2 schematically a crypto wallet according to a second embodiment.

Embodiments of the invention

According to the invention, transfer addresses (hashes) are generated for the account of a seller by trial and error until an address has been found which contains information about the desired position. For example, to encode a GPS address with an accuracy of 10 meters, approx. 12 decimal places and therefore approx. 37 bits would be necessary.

For comparison: The costs for generating a hash value with 17 predetermined bits when “mining” the cryptocurrency Bitcoin are already between 10,000 and 100,000 euros. Since these costs increase many times over with each additional predetermined bit using the same technology, the representation of a specific complete GPS address within the transfer address is therefore not economical.

According to the invention, the regions of the world are therefore identified, for example, on the basis of the existing national and international dialing codes, so that the validity of a transfer address can be restricted with two decimal digits or 7 bits so that it can be assigned to a country such as Germany. With another decimal digit or 10 bits, the address can be assigned to a federal state such as Baden-Württemberg. With a fourth digit or 14 bits, the location can be restricted with sufficient accuracy that a transfer address comprising this information can be assigned to a manageable number of cities and locations.

The more decimal digits with location reference a transfer address contains according to one embodiment of the invention, the greater the costs and effort for the generation of this address. This in turn suggests that the address is used more often due to the high cost of its generation, and ultimately the greater the trustworthiness of the address thus constructed.

1 illustrates the basic sequence of a method according to the invention ( 10 ) in an application scenario according to 2 : A crypto wallet ( 20 ) measures the current position (process 11 ) and checks whether the recipient address meets the necessary criteria in relation to the current position (decision 12 - 1 ). Only if these criteria are met (branch Y - 1 ), calculates the crypto wallet ( 20 ) with the help of the private key the public keys to legitimize the transfer (process 13 ).

In the crypto wallet ( 20 ) can be stored to which geographic areas transfers should be restricted. For example, the crypto wallet ( 20 ) of a vehicle ( 30 ) are configured so that they generally only allow transfers to addresses within Europe.

In the case of automated transfers, in which the user makes the payment transaction ( 16 ) does not have to confirm (e.g. by pressing a button), it can also be checked whether the transfer address is close to the vehicle ( 30 ) or the crypto wallet ( 20 ) is located. To the vehicle's own location ( 30 ), the crypto wallet ( 20 ) to information from GPS, GSM model or other wireless interface ( 34 ) of the vehicle or even more safely with your own GPS or your own wireless interface ( 34 ) can be equipped.

In the crypto wallet ( 20 ) can also be stored in a table, which "area codes" are how far apart. The crypto wallet ( 20 ) then uses the table to check how far the location of the transfer address is from your current location. Only if the distance is small enough does the crypto wallet ( 20 ) the payment transaction ( 16 ) out. By calculating the distance, it is also possible to pay in areas close to the border if the wireless interface ( 34 ) dials into a cell tower in the neighboring country, even though the vehicle ( 30 ) is actually in their own country. In a table of the crypto wallet ( 20 ) GPS coordinates of the area codes could also be stored. With the help of this table and a GPS receiver, the distance could then also be calculated.

An attack could be designed so that the vehicle ( 30 ) a large number of different transfer addresses are passed in the hope that a transfer address will be randomly below it, at which the distance is so short that the crypto wallet ( 20 ) the payment transaction ( 16 ) actually executes. To reduce the chances of success of such an attack to a minimum, the crypto wallet ( 20 ) the longer breaks between transfer attempts, the more successive payment transactions have failed due to the distance criterion. In addition to the number of failures, the break times can also be calculated depending on the distances themselves, in that the breaks last longer the further away the seat or place of residence of the payee of an unsuccessful transfer attempt was.

The examples above for paying with a vehicle ( 30 ) The method steps and considerations described are to be applied in a corresponding manner to payment with the aid of smartphones, computers, GPS receivers, car diagnostic devices or other mobile devices, without leaving the scope of the invention.

QUOTES INCLUDE IN THE DESCRIPTION

This list of documents listed by the applicant has been generated automatically and is only included for the better information of the reader. The list is not part of the German patent or utility model application. The DPMA assumes no liability for any errors or omissions.

Patent literature cited

• DE 102016206916 A1 [0004]

Claims (10)

Method (10) for processing a payment transaction (16) with a crypto wallet (20) to a payee with a specified address (14), characterized by the following features: - a position of the wallet (20) is determined (11 ), - a check (12) is carried out to determine whether the address (14) is geographically related to the location and - depending on the check (12), a release (13) of the payment transaction (16) is optionally given. Method (10) according to Claim 1 , characterized by the following feature: - in the case of release (13), the wallet (20) uses the address (14) and the released payment transaction (16) to carry out a transaction calculation (15). Method (10) according to Claim 1 or 2 , characterized by the following features: - the wallet (20) is managed by a vehicle (30) with an on-board diagnostic interface (31) and buyer functions (32), - the payee performs seller functions (41) in a cloud (40) and - the payment transaction (16) and the address (14) are exchanged between the vehicle (30) and the cloud (40) via a wireless interface (34). Method (10) according to one of the Claims 1 to 3 , characterized by the following features: - the address (14) of the payee is generated by repeatedly determining a scatter value of different random numbers and a secret key and - if the scatter value designates a place of residence or place of residence of the payee in accordance with a predetermined scheme, the scatter value is called uses the address (14). Method (10) according to Claim 4 , characterized by the following feature: - according to the diagram, the scatter value denotes the seat or place of residence, provided that a decimal representation of the scatter value at least partially contains a telephone area code with an area that includes the seat or place of residence. Method (10) according to one of the Claims 1 to 5 , characterized by the following feature: - the release (13) is only granted if the address (14) falls below a predetermined distance to the location. Method (10) according to Claim 6 , characterized by at least one of the following features: - the distance is determined by means of a table stored in the wallet (20), which indicates the distance of the areas from one another for two telephone prefixes with different areas, or - the distance is determined by means of a in the wallet ( 20) stored table determines which specifies geographic coordinates for several telephone area codes with different areas. Computer program which is set up, the method (10) according to one of the Claims 1 to 7 perform. Machine-readable storage medium on which the computer program is based Claim 8 is saved. Device (20, 30) which is set up to process (10) according to one of the Claims 1 to 7 perform.

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