Blockchain Papers

Chris Berg, Sinclair Davidson, Jason Potts

No abstract is available for this record.

Andrew LR, Douglas AO

Bitcoin is a decentralized, pseudonymous, virtual currency which has been linked to many nefarious activities, such as money laundering, ransomware demands, and the purchase of contraband goods and services. Although it has many redeeming features such as low transaction costs, no charge-backs, and service to the world’s 2.5 billion unbanked, the public has become aware of Bitcoin through spectacular news stories of corruption and criminal activities. Techniques to investigate Bitcoin and to identify its users are therefore required to enforce laws and protect the public. This paper discusses what Bitcoin is and how it works, and explores various investigative methodologies to perform Bitcoin network analysis, transactional analysis, and wallet analysis. Finally, this paper discusses emerging issues and suggests areas for improvement with the goal of gaining general acceptance of investigative techniques for admissibility as scientific evidence in courtroom testimony.

Margaret Ryznar

Bitcoin emerged as a cryptocurrency relying on new blockchain technology in 2009, but how to regulate it was not immediately clear. The recent emergence of bitcoin futures poses a new level of risk to the economy, again raising questions of regulation. This is the first law review article to examine the potential regulatory regime for bitcoin futures.

Riya Jimmy, S Gokul, J. Jayashankar

Thefnancial frauds are increasing at an alarming rate. The stake holders have lost a huge amount of money through these fnancial frauds. India is no way different. Even though it has a huge potential to grow the increasing fnancial frauds and white-collar crimes are a hindrance to it. To put an end to it we require a tool called forensic accounting. Forensic accounting is an integration of accounting, auditing and investigation. They keep on looking at the possibility of exposing frauds. They are meant for identifying the transactions which are not authentic and gathering evidence against the same which can be provided as a proof in the court of law. Forensic accounting is at an infant stage. And through our study we would like through analyse the extent to which forensic accounting act as a detection tool in reducing white collar crimes. And this study would throw light on the stakeholders who are still unaware of this concept and thus their chance of getting cheated become reduced. And there by a reduction in fnancial frauds and white-collar crimes.

Gloria Yang Yu, Jinyuan Zhang

No abstract is available for this record.

Sergey Avdoshin, Vladimir A. Lazarenko

Bitcoin is the most popular cryptocurrency on the planet. It relies on strong cryptography and peer-to-peer network. Bitcoin is gaining more and more popularity in criminal society. That is why Bitcoin is often used as money laundering tool or payment method for illegal products and services. In this paper we explore various methods for Bitcoin users deanonimization, which is an important task in anti-money laundering process and cybercrime investigation.

Alistair Milne

Abstract This paper documents inconsistent terminologies and misleading analogies in current discussions of digital money and payments. It offers a more consistent framework for understanding the potential of technological innovation in providing the functions of money and payments: as media of exchange, stores of value, and units of account and the implications of cryptographic technologies underpinning cryptocurrencies for the future of money and payments. These could support efficiency gains in money and payments, but decentralization is not inherent to their application. Radical reform leading to improved economic outcomes is conceivable, but not through disruptive displacement of existing institutional arrangements.

Saide Zhu, Wei Li, Hong Li, Chunqiang Hu · 5 authors

The past three years have seen the rapid increase of Bitcoin difficulty, which has led to a substantial variance in solo mining. As a result, miners tend to join a large open pool to get a more stable reward. Nowadays, mining pools take up over 98% of Bitcoins total computation power. In a sense, this is a manifestation of Bitcoin that tends to be centralized. Thus, researchers have shown an increased interest in pool mining payoff and security. The purpose of this paper is to review and summarize recent research in Bitcoin pool mining system. We first introduce several common reward distribution schemes, and analyze their advantages and disadvantages with some improvement mechanisms; In the second section, to address pool security problems, we examined the practical utility of some existing and potential attack strategies. To study those malicious attack in details, several defense methods are collected. Finally, we make an outlook on Bitcoin future.

Peder Østbye

Bitcoin and many other cryptocurrencies have currency-caps implemented in their protocols. Bitcoin is capped at approximately 21 million bitcoins. These protocols are complied by consenting operators. This paper discusses whether such currency-caps are illegal quantity-fixing conspiracies in violation of antitrust law. It is found that there is a present antitrust risk for cryptocurrency operators. This may render such operators subject to criminal and civil liabilities.

Alexander Brauneis, Roland Mestel, Ryan Riordan, Erik Theissen

We study trading of Bitcoin against US dollar (BTCUSD) on exchanges in three continents, Bitfinex, Bitstamp and Coinbase Pro. We use a high frequency dataset that contains transactions and order book information. The BTCUSD market is highly liquid in terms of bid-ask spreads and order book depth. While spreads are even lower than in equity markets, prices are not integrated across exchanges. Persistent differences exist between the three exchanges in terms of trade prices and posted prices often violating no-arbitrage assumptions. The liquidity of the Bitcoin exchanges is predominantly determined by local factors and is essentially independent of liquidity in equity and FX markets. This suggests that despite the virtual nature of Bitcoin, local jurisdictional factors affect the flow of capital between low and high price jurisdictions.

Benito Arruuada, Luis Garicano

By allowing networks to split, decentralized blockchain platforms protect members against hold up, but hinder coordination, given that adaptation decisions are ultimately decentralized. The current solutions to improve coordination, based on “premining” cryptocoins, taxing members and incentivizing developers, are insufficient. For blockchain to fulfill its promise and out-compete centralized firms, it needs to develop new forms of “soft” decentralized governance (anarchic, aristocratic, democratic, and autocratic) that allow networks to avoid bad equilibria.

Usman Chohan

No abstract is available for this record.

Ilaria Bertazzi, Sylvie Huet, Guillaume Deffuant, Floriana Gargiulo

Bitcoin-otc is a peer to peer (over-the-counter) marketplace for trading with bit- coin crypto-currency. To mitigate the risks of the p2p unsupervised exchanges, the establishment of a reliable reputation systems is needed: for this reason, a web of trust is implemented on the website. The availability of all the historic of the users interaction data makes this dataset a unique playground for studying reputation dynamics through others evaluations. We analyze the structure and the dynamics of this web of trust with a multilayer network approach distin- guishing the rewarding and the punitive behaviors. We show that the rewarding and the punitive behavior have similar emergent topological properties (apart from the clustering coefficient being higher for the rewarding layer) and that the resultant reputation originates from the complex interaction of the more regular behaviors on the layers. We show which are the behaviors that correlate (i.e. the rewarding activity) or not (i.e. the punitive activity) with reputation. We show that the network activity presents bursty behaviors on both the layers and that the inequality reaches a steady value (higher for the rewarding layer) with the network evolution. Finally, we characterize the reputation trajectories and we identify prototypical behaviors associated to three classes of users: trustworthy, untrusted and controversial.

Lawrence J. Trautman

No abstract is available for this record.

Saman Jafari, Tien Dang Vo-Huu, Bahruz Jabiyev, Alejandro Mera · 5 authors

No abstract is available for this record.

Oleksii Konashevych, Marta Poblet

Governments across the world are testing different uses of the blockchain for the delivery of their public services. Blockchain hashing–or the insertion of data in the blockchain–is one of the potential applications of the blockchain in this space. With this method, users can apply special scripts to add their data to blockchain transactions, ensuring both immutability and publicity. Blockchain hashing also secures the integrity of the original data stored on central governmental databases. The paper starts by analysing possible scenarios of hashing on the blockchain and assesses in which cases it may work and in which it is less likely to add value to a public administration. Second, the paper also compares this method with traditional digital signatures using PKI (Public Key Infrastructure) and discusses standardisation in each domain. Third, it also addresses issues related with concepts such as “distributed ledger technology” and “permissioned blockchains.” Finally, it raises the question of whether blockchain hashing is an effective solution for electronic governance, and concludes that its value is controversial, even if it is improved by PKI and other security measures. In this regard, we claim that governments need first to identify pain points in governance, and then consider the trade-offs of the blockchain as a potential solution versus other alternatives.

Shaen Corbet, Brian M. Lucey, Andrew Urquhart, Larisa Yarovaya

This paper provides a systematic review of the empirical literature based on the major topics that have been associated with the market for cryptocurrencies since their development
\nas a financial asset in 2009. Despite astonishing price appreciation in recent years, cryptocurrencies have been subjected to accusations of pricing bubbles central to the trilemma
\nthat exists between regulatory oversight, the potential for illicit use through its anonymity
\nwithin a young under-developed exchange system, and infrastructural breaches influenced
\nby the growth of cybercriminality. Each influence the perception of the role of cryptocurrencies as a credible investment asset class and legitimate of value.

Usman W. Chohan

No abstract is available for this record.

Felix Irresberger, Ruomei Yang

This paper studies the concentration of block production in selected Proof-of-Stake (PoS) blockchains and finds evidence consistent with participants entering and leaving the consensus process, thereby changing the concentration level, but not with disproportionate compounding of wealth for large stakes.

Stephen Chan, Jeffrey Chu, Yuanyuan Zhang, Saralees Nadarajah

In financial trading, cryptocurrencies like bitcoin use decentralization, traceability, and anonymity features to perform transactional activities. These digital currencies, using the emerging blockchain technologies, are forming the basis of the largest unregulated markets in the world. This creates various regulatory challenges, including the illicit purchase of drugs and weapons, money laundering, and funding terrorist activities. This chapter analyzes various legal and ethical implications, their effects, and various solutions to overcome the inherent issues that are currently faced by the policymakers and regulators. The authors present the result of an analysis of 30 recently published peer-reviewed scientific publications and suggest various mechanisms that can help in the detection and prevention of illegal activities that currently account for a substantial proportion of cryptocurrency trading. They suggest methods and applications that can also be used to identify the dark marketplaces in the future.

Usman W. Chohan

The question of regulation in the domain of cryptocurrencies has been tackled in various ways, exhibiting therein a desire to strike a balance between fostering innovation and promoting oversight. This chapter examines the case of BitLicense, issued by the New York Department of Financial Services (DFS), with the aim of contextualizing the relative merits of regulatory and oversight initiatives in the domain of cryptocurrencies. This includes an examination of the impact and critiques regarding BitLicense since its promulgation, along with the use of perspectives from public value theory (PVT) to contextualize the value creation efforts of the DFS using BitLicense as a regulatory instrument. The findings of the chapter suggest that contrasting views exist on the value creation of cryptocurrency regulations, and this is reflected both in a PVT approach as well as the evolving praxis of virtual currency regulatory and oversight efforts.

Raffaella Barone, Donato Masciandaro

No abstract is available for this record.

Usman W. Chohan

This discussion paper examines the recent history of cryptocurrency thefts and exchanges shutdowns, focusing specifically on the largest cryptoinstrument: Bitcoin. The examination of thefts and shutdowns are intended to draw academic attention to the accountability deficits that pervade the cryptocurrency space, and the findings of the paper suggest that a much more robust accountability, transparency, and oversight architecture must be put in place vis-a-vis cryptocurrencies.

Shaen Corbet, Brian M. Lucey, Maurice Peat, Samuel A. Vigne

No abstract is available for this record.