Chinese tech firms pitch blockchain paint to goose facial recognition in April Fool's Day gags

Fake news is officially allowed on one day of the year: April 1 – April Fool’s Day. 

Western tech firms are known to have fun with it, especially search giant Google, which this year adopted a “Where’s Waldo?” gag for Google Maps users. US carrier T-Mobile came out with a fictitious video ad for a “smartshoephone.” “From your favourite flip phone to the world’s first foot phone,” the fake ad said. 

Chinese technology firms also got into the spirit. Here are five of the best – the first three were verified by the companies as jokes, while the last two were reported to be April Fool’s jokes by local media.

1. Ant Financial

Alibaba Group’s payment affiliate and operator of Alipay, announced Block 7 – the world’s first blockchain paint. Vehicles painted with Block 7 become instantly interconnected with multi-level encryption and decentralised data input.

In the event of road accidents, the technology can replicate the scene immediately by acquiring all the information captured by sensors linked to the blockchain, to prevent fraudsters from claiming compensation as fake victims.