Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba has secured a US patent on a blockchain-based solution that aims to fix one of the major issues in the record industry: music plagiarism.
The patent for blockchain-based music “originality analysis,” which was awarded by the US Patent and Trademark Office on April 21st, uses the decentralized ledger technology behind Bitcoin to systematically vet songs.
According to the patent application, a validation node would analyze the lyrics, tempo and tune of a song and then compare the results to a music catalog to determine whether it is original.
The data is then added to the blockchain. Repeating the process with other nodes, which analyze different musical factors, can eventually verify the originality of the track.
The company hopes that the solution can expose and prevent copycats from stealing copyrighted music.
Alibaba is among several multinational corporations that are exploring blockchain for a wide range of use cases spanning multiple industries, from entertainment to financial services.
Tokyo-based Sony Corporation recently launched its new enterprise blockchain solution for the transportation industry. In addition, big four accounting firm EY has launched a new Ethereum-based blockchain with collaborators Microsoft and ConsenSys to power private, secure and regulatory-compliant transactions for businesses.
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