Bringing Bitcoin-based micropayments to the Internet of Things

Cryptotronix recently announced a partnership with TilePay, a decentralized payment system based on the Bitcoin blockchain, to bring cryptocurrency payments to Internet of Things (IoT) devices. The collaboration is hoping to make secure payments for real-time access to IoT sensors using micropayments a reality.

Cryptotronix is building open-source authentication hardware and firmware to allow Pinocc.io devices to securely participate in TilePay. The solution is built around Atmel’s ATECC108 crypto engine which allows each TilePay-enabled sensor to have a unique ECDSA private key. (The same chip can be found on the CryptoCape, a dedicated security daughterboard for the BeagleBone created by SparkFun Electronics and Cryptotronix.) This lets users purchasing sensor data to verify the authenticity and origination of the data.

“Let’s consider an example. A company, organization, or a private citizen spends their own money to setup a temperature sensor network. The administrators can offer the temperature service for free (maybe they’re generous), they can charge a subscription fee to the service, or maybe they provide a free service that is subsidized with ads. With TilePay, there is a better option. TilePay will allow real-time access to the sensor and the users only pay for what they use using Bitcoin-based micropayments,” the team writes.

While the CryptoBackPack is currently only a prototype, Cryptotronix shares that it will be releasing the hardware design files and firmware soon.