Blockchain Papers

Zewen Wu

No abstract is available for this record.

Martijn de Vos, Georgy Ishmaev, Johan Pouwelse

The popularity of blockchain technology has bootstrapped many “Web3” applications, e.g., Ethereum and IPFS, that apply distributed ledger technology to store transactions. The amount of transactions generated and stored in such Web3 applications is significant and, in its raw form, usually not searchable by users. Existing Web3 transaction indexing and search engines are predominantly centralized and, therefore, can manipulate search results or censor particular queries. With the proliferation of Web3 transactions and applications, a decentralized and censorship-resistant search primitive is becoming essential. We present DeScan, a decentralized and censorship-resistant indexing and search engine for Web3. Users index their local Web3 transactions using custom rules that output triplets. Generated triplets are bundled in a distributed transaction graph that is searchable by other users. To coordinate search and distribute the storage of the transaction graph over peers in the network, we build upon a Skip Graph (SG) data structure. Since the Skip Graph does not provide any resilience against adversarial peers that censor searches, we propose four modifications to improve its robustness. We implement DeScan and conduct experiments with up to 12 800 peers and 10 million Ethereum transactions. Our experiments show that DeScan with our modifications enabled can tolerate 20% adversarial peers and 35% unresponsive peers without disruption. Moreover, we find that searches in DeScan are usually completed well within a second, even when the network grows. Finally, we show that storage and network costs are evenly distributed amongst peers as the network grows.

Sabina Marchetti

‘Web3’ is shorthand for decentralized internet applications built on blockchains. Based on distributed ledger technology, Web3 applications seamlessly encompass value tokenization (the basis of peer-to-peer payments and many other uses) and decentralized management of information, with great emphasis on their aspiration to re-shape the digital economy. To date, Web3 initiatives have been attracting sizeable resources from venture capital firms. Nevertheless, the technological limitations at the basis of decentralized applications prevent a full understanding of the effective potential of Web3. Our work provides an essential overview of the phenomenon, with a focus on the actual incentives it offers to different economic agents as well as to individuals. We pinpoint the key drivers that may contribute to the large-scale establishment of distributed ledger technology as the new paradigm underlying internet applications, and differentiate them from the hype put forward by the crypto-community.

Chenyu Zhou, Hongzhou Chen, Shiman Wang, Xinyao Sun · 6 authors

Blockchain, pivotal in shaping the metaverse and Web3, often draws criticism for high energy consumption and carbon emission. The rise of sustainability-focused blockchains, especially when intersecting with innovative wireless technologies, revises this predicament. To understand blockchain's role in sustainability, we propose a three-layers structure encapsulating four green utilities: Recording and Tracking, Wide Verification, Value Trading, and Concept Disseminating. Nori, a decentralized voluntary carbon offset project, serves as our case, illuminating these utilities. Our research unveils unique insights into the on-chain carbon market participants, affect factors of the market, value propositions of NFT-based carbon credits, and the role of social media to spread the concept of carbon offset. We argue that blockchain's contribution to sustainability is significant, with carbon offsetting potentially evolving as a new standard within the blockchain sector.

Thibault Schrepel

Web2 giants and Web3 projects entertain a complex relationship. They cooperate to maximize their chances of survival, yet they also compete through a combination of dynamic factors and anti-competitive strategies. The present contribution untangles Web2 and Web3’s relationship, explores their distinct value propositions, and outlines what may be one of tomorrow’s enforcement priorities for antitrust agencies.

Lin William Cong, Kimberly Grauer, Daniel Rabetti, Henry Updegrave

We provide an overview of crypto-related scams, including investment scams, Ponzi schemes, and more recently, rug pulls that are commonly seen in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) projects. We then discuss data sources for studying Initial Coin Offering (ICO) scams, before examining the case of PlusToken, the largest crypto scam, AnubisDAO, the prototypical rug pull, and Luno's anti-scam initiative, a good prototype for other cryptocurrency exchanges and service entities to follow. User protection and education are crucial in preventing scams, despite the fact that they may require efforts from centralized entities and regulators.

Jincheng Zheng, David Kuo Chuen Lee

The Internet has undergone numerous changes since its emergence in 1969 and has now become an indispensable aspect of modern life. With the introduction of the World Wide Web by Tim Berners-Lee, the Internet has transformed into a tool for sharing and accessing vast amounts of information. As the Internet evolves towards its third iteration, Web3+ offers a decentralized solution that empowers users and returns control over the Internet to them. With the rise of cryptocurrency and blockchain, Web3+ focuses on data ownership and protection, making the Internet more secure and fair for everyone. In this article, we will explore the differences between Web 1.0, Web 2.0, Web 3.0, Web3, and Web3+ and how they shape the future of the Internet.

Quinn DuPont

Abstract This paper critically evaluates the political economy of Web3 and offers a neo-institutional model to explain qualitative observations of contemporary digital social movements. By starting to develop a sociological model of Web3 rooted in micro-organizational practices, including trust mediation and social coproduction, this paper re-evaluates assumptions of scarcity, economic value, and social belonging. It concludes by introducing a novel research program to study digital polycentric governance that focuses on community self-governance of digital common pool resources (DCPRs) and looks forward to empirical research using on-chain datasets from decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs).

Jathan Sadowski, Kaitlin Beegle

The self-proclaimed usurper of Web 2.0, Web3 quickly became the center of attention. Not long ago, the public discourse was saturated with projects, promises, and peculiarities of Web3. Now the spotlight has swung around to focus on the many faults, failures, and frauds of Web3. The cycles of technological trends and investment bubbles seem to be accelerating in such a way as to escape any attempt at observing them in motion before they crash, and then everybody moves on to the next thing. Importantly, Web3 was not an anomaly or curiosity in the broader tech industry. It articulates patterns that existed before Web3 and will exist after. Web3 should be understood as a case study of innovation within the dominant model of Silicon Valley venture capitalism. Our focus in this article is on understanding how the movement around Web3 formed through an interplay between (1) normative concepts and contestations related to ideas of “decentralization” and (2) political economic interests and operations related to the dynamics of fictitious capital. By offering a critical analysis of Web3, our goal is also to show how any even potentially progressive (or as we call them “expansive”) forms of Web3 development struggle for success, recognition, and attention due to the wild excesses of hype and investment devoted to “extractive” forms of Web3. In the process, they provide us a better view of how different arrangements of technopolitics can exist at the same time, side-by-side, in complicated ways.

Kelsie Nabben

The term ‘Web3’ refers to the practices of participating in digital infrastructures through the ability to read, write and coordinate digital assets. Web3 is hailed as an alternative to the failings of big tech, offering a participatory mode of digital self-organizing and shared ownership of digital infrastructure through software-encoded governance rules and participatory practices. Yet, very few analytical frameworks have been presented in academic literature by which to approach Web3. This piece draws on the theoretical lens of infrastructure studies to offer an analytical framework to approach the emergent field of Web3 as an exploration in ‘how to infrastructure’ through prefigurative self-infrastructuring. Drawing on qualitative examples from digital ethnographic methods, I demonstrate how the origins of Web3 reveal the intentions of its creators as a political tool of prefiguration, yet its practices reveal the inherent tension of expressing these ideals in coherent technical and institutional infrastructure. Thus, I argue that one of the fundamental challenges Web3 is negotiating through technical and governance experiments is ‘how to self-infrastructure?’.

Partha Pratim Ray

Web3, the next generation web, promises a decentralized and democratized internet that puts users in control of their data and online identities. However, Web3 faces significant challenges, including scalability, interoperability, regulatory compliance, and energy consumption. To address these challenges, this review paper provides a comprehensive analysis of Web3, including its key advancements and implications, as well as an overview of its major applications in Decentralized Applications (DApps), Decentralized Finance (DeFi), Non-fungible Tokens (NFTs), Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAOs), and Supply Chain Management and Provenance Tracking. The paper also discusses the potential social and economic impact of Web3, as well as its integration with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI), the Internet of Things (IoT), and smart cities. This article then discusses importance of zero-trust architecture for Web3. Ultimately, this review highlights the importance of Web3 in shaping the future of the internet and provides insights into the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.

Вячеслав Дзюндзюк, Б. В. Дзюндзюк

Blockchain is one of the most innovative technologies that is currently used in many areas as part of the spread of web3 technologies. Although the origins of blockchain are linked to the emergence of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin, today’s application of blockchain technology focuses on a wider range of issues where trust is required for a large number of transactions. For this reason, many researchers today believe that these technologies have great potential for use in the public sector. The public sector can use these technologies to fulfill its role as a generator of innovation and progress, which is part of its responsibilities, and to modernize projects that will enable citizens to receive the services they need. Therefore, this work aims to determine the main factors of success or failure in the implementation of blockchain technology in public authorities based on the analysis of existing experience in this area, in particular, in EU member states. Blockchain has proven useful for government agencies for several reasons. First, blockchain is a technology characterized by the ability to generate trust in information and processes in a heterogeneous context with a large number of participants and users. Second, blockchain facilitates governance by leaving no traces and acts as a tool to promote transparency, as it allows people to know who did what and when. Third, it eliminates the need for a centralized certificate authority to control access and use of services by large groups of people. Fourth, the successful development of blockchain-based systems can lead to significant cost savings. However, the analysis shows that authorities are not yet ready to widely use and offer blockchain-based services. In many cases, a lack of understanding of the benefits and opportunities, as well as a still unclear interpretation of the legal and regulatory environment, prevent senior executives from making decisions that may involve greater risk. With this in mind, we believe that the implementation of blockchain technology in the public sector can be facilitated by the implementation of blockchain systems as a complement to existing tracking and transparency systems and processes, as well as increasing their efficiency while simultaneously reducing the cost of services provided. This will require the development of adaptive management structures in public institutions aimed at developing reasonable and acceptable solutions to solve real problems.

Jiajing Wu, Kaixin Lin, Dan Lin, Ziye Zheng · 6 authors

At present, the concept of metaverse has sparked widespread attention from the public to major industries. With the rapid development of blockchain and Web3 technologies, the decentralized metaverse ecology has attracted a large influx of users and capital. Due to the lack of industry standards and regulatory rules, the Web3-empowered metaverse ecosystem has witnessed a variety of financial crimes, such as scams, code exploit, wash trading, money laundering, and illegal services and shops. To this end, it is especially urgent and critical to summarize and classify the financial security threats on the Web3-empowered metaverse in order to maintain the long-term healthy development of its ecology. In this paper, we first outline the background, foundation, and applications of the Web3 metaverse. Then, we provide a comprehensive overview and taxonomy of the security risks and financial crimes that have emerged since the development of the decentralized metaverse. For each financial crime, we focus on three issues: a) existing definitions, b) relevant cases and analysis, and c) existing academic research on this type of crime. Next, from the perspective of academic research and government policy, we summarize the current anti-crime measurements and technologies in the metaverse. Finally, we discuss the opportunities and challenges in behavioral mining and the potential regulation of financial activities in the metaverse. The overview of this paper is expected to help readers better understand the potential security threats in this emerging ecology, and to provide insights and references for financial crime fighting.

Shruti Gatkal, Pornima Borole, Anushka Kawale, Abhijit Mahajan

Blockchain is a peer-to-peer distributed ledger technology that makes the records of any digital asset transparent and immutable and works without involving a third party. Hence, it is independent of a third party and termed as ‘decentralized’. Blockchain is an emerging technology and is gaining a lot of popularity, as it is scalable and also has the ability to manage risks. Blockchain is transforming the way value is exchanged, it has expanded technical capabilities to achieve a higher level of innovation and developer products. Blockchain is the most recent technology that can be adopted for data security. This paper aims to make any legal contracts, such as agreements, and property registries, as well as other assets in India using blockchain for solving issues like avoiding third parties, brokerage services, trusty transactions, etc. It makes it safer as well as non-repudiable. We are proposing a Web3 system that is providing a platform for both parties to make legal contracts using smart contracts and deploy it on blockchain to make safer contracts by inheriting blockchain properties. A smart contract is a digital contract that automatically executes the terms of an agreement by itself. In layman’s terms, it is a computer code that holds the terms of a contract. It stores in decentralized, distributed public blockchain networks that contracting parties can access from anywhere and at any time. With these designs, this digital type of contract runs on blockchain nodes that cannot be changed. This makes the smart contract legal contracting decentralized, free of brokerage services as well paperless that is digital. This solution demands transparency, participation and cooperation society demands. Hence, would help to obstruct corruption and make government services more efficient.

Jordan M. Thompson, Ryan Benac, Kidus Olana, Talha Hassan · 6 authors

NFTrig is a web-based application created for use as an educational tool to teach trigonometry and block chain technology. Creation of the application includes front and back end development as well as integration with other outside sources including MetaMask and OpenSea. The primary development languages include HTML, CSS (Bootstrap 5), and JavaScript as well as Solidity for smart contract creation. The application itself is hosted on Moralis utilizing their Web3 API. This technical report describes how the application was created, what the application requires, and smart contract design with security considerations in mind. The NFTrig application has underwent significant testing and validation prior to and after deployment. Future suggestions and recommendations for further development, maintenance, and use in other fields for education are also described.

Rui Qin, Wenwen Ding, Juanjuan Li, Sangtian Guan · 7 authors

Empowered by blockchain and Web3 technologies, decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) are able to redefine resources, production relations, and organizational structures in a revolutionary manner. This article aims to reanalyze DAOs from the perspectives of organization and operation, and provide a more precise definition of DAOs as Decentralized Autonomous Organizations and Operations. Based on this, the fundamental principles and requirements of DAOs are explained, while the infrastructure based on cyber–physical–social system (CPSS) and parallel intelligence, as well as the supporting technologies, such as digital twins, metaverse, and Web3, are discussed. Besides, a five-layer intelligent architecture is presented, and the closed-loop equation and new function-oriented intelligent algorithms are also proposed. Moreover, the governance mechanisms from the individual, organizational and social perspectives are discussed, and the incentive mechanisms for the human, robot, and digital human are analyzed. This article can be regarded as a stepping stone for further research and developments of DAOs.

guochymtaf

Web3 geliştirme ve tokenleştirmenin geleceği, aynı zamanda ademi merkeziyetçilik ve anonimlik ilkelerine bağlı kalırken karşı tarafları tanımlayabilme ve doğrulayabilme üzerine inşa edilecek. İş dünyasının en büyük isimleri için zorlu bir paradoks - sadece Elon Musk'a sorun! Neden bu hale geldik ve buraya nasıl geldik? Temel olarak, internet veya Web 1.0, bir kimlik katmanı olmadan inşa edildi. Geliştirilmesine dahil olan herkes bilindiği ve güvenildiği için buna gerek yoktu. Sosyal medya ve Web 2.0 ortaya çıktığında, büyük teknoloji şirketleri tarafından sağlanmış olsa da, kullanıcıların kendi kimliklerini oluşturmalarına olanak sağladı.

Darshana M Chigari, Dashvath R, Chandrakanth K J, Bhavya Das D · 5 authors

The evolution of Blockchain has given way to a Smart World where there is improved security and integration of devices, systems, and processes with humans through all-pervasive connectivity. There are numerous secure applications using Blockchain like smart cities, Cloud Computing, Smart Management of the Environment and Healthcare, etc.A decentralized voting system is an option for the paper ballot system and EVM (Electronic Voting Machines). Democracies need a decentralized voting system that offers security, integrity, immutability, transparency, and privacy to voters. Blockchain is an emerging technology that offers integrity, immutability, and decentralization of data. Moving our traditional voting system to Blockchain technology can increase voter confidence. This paper describes an attempt to influence the advantages of Blockchain, such as cryptography and transparency, to accomplish an efficient scheme for a decentralized voting system using the Ethereum network. Smart contracts are profound chunks of codes, which are included in the Blockchain and then execute written code as planned in each stage of Blockchain updates. Decentralized voting is one of the trending topics, but is yet to be significant, compared to the other e-services.

Pedro Ákos Costa, João Leitão, Yannis Psaras

Web3 aims at creating a decentralized platform that is competitive with modern cloud infrastructures that support today's Internet. However, Web3 is still limited, supporting only applications in the domains of content creation and sharing, decentralized financing, and decentralized communication. This is mainly due to the technologies supporting Web3: blockchain, IPFS, and libp2p, that although provide a good collection of tools to develop Web3 applications, are still limited in terms of design and performance. This motivates the need to better understand these technologies as to enable novel optimizations that can push Web3 to its full potential. Unfortunately, understanding the current behavior of a fully decentralized large-scale distributed system is a difficult task, as there is no centralized authority that has full knowledge of the system operation. To this end, in this paper we characterize the workload of IPFS, a key enabler of Web3. To achieve this, we have collected traces from accesses performed by users to one of the most popular IPFS gateways located in North America for a period of two weeks. Through the fine analysis of these traces, we gathered the amount of requests to the system, and found the providers of the requested content. With this data, we characterize both the popularity of requested and provided content, as well as their geo-location (by matching IP address with the MaxMind database). Our results show that most of the requests in IPFS are only to a few different content, that is provided by large portion of peers in the system. Furthermore, our analysis also shows that most requests are provided by the two largest portions of providers in the system, located in North America and Europe. With these insights, we conclude that the current IPFS architecture is sub-optimal and propose a research agenda for the future.

Guangsheng Yu, Qin Wang, Tingting Bi, Shiping Chen · 5 authors

Architectural design contexts contain a set of factors that greatly influence software application development. Among them, organizational design contexts consist of high-level company concerns and how it is structured, for example, stakeholders and development schedules heavily impacting design considerations. The Decentralized Autonomous Organization (DAO), as a vital concept in the Web3 space, represents an organization constructed by automatically executed rules, such as via smart contracts, holding features of the permissionless committee, transparent proposals, and fair contribution by participated stakeholders. In this work, we conduct a systematic literature review of existing DAO literature to summarize its structural features, benefits and challenges, and potential development directions in the context of Web3 applications.

Hanna Gawel

The blockchain ecosystem has undergone three distinct periods of exponential growth — the ICO boom of 2017, the Defi summer of 2020, and most recently the NFT wave of 2021.However, it was not yet seen a “web3-native” approach towards NFTs from any major brand. By that, we mean that no brand has upended its Web 2.0 architecture and replaced it entirely with a web3 stack. Instead, brands have taken a more measured approach, exploring NFT drops, integrations, and community growth developed separately from their core offerings. This phase can be described as Web 2.5. In this article, the author attempts to define what Web 2.5 is concerning informatology, along with identifying the potential future challenges of information management in this area and the new iteration of digital development, namely Web 3.0 or web3.

Sudeep Krishnan

eCommerce merchants anticipate adoption of cryptocurrencies in a vast scale in the coming years. While the concepts of Web3 are being adopted, business leaders and decision makers need to understand key the elements of Web3 and technological constructs behind the evolution of Web3. This study focuses on defining these constructs of Web3 and explain technological differences as compared to Web 2.0. Using extensive academic, industry, and online information, the study defines major characteristics of Web3, show cases early adopters, use cases, and opportunities in the area. Web3 is still evolving and there are many challenges which needs to be addressed. eCommerce businesses who are going to sustainably change the business models or disrupt with a new Web3 business is likely to succeed in the coming years. The findings of this study are also validated with an expert interview.

Vivek Dubey, Azher Mokashi, Ranjan K. Pradhan, Paresh Gupta · 5 authors

This whitepaper discusses the potential of Metaverse to revolutionize the banking industry. It highlights the various ways in which banks can leverage Metaverse to improve their operations, including through the use of NFTs, blockchain technology, and smart contracts. The paper is aimed to explore the possibilities of Metaverse in the Banking Industry and understand its practical implementation radius. This paper navigates to various topics from the definition of Metaverse to business aspects in banking and financial services. Explores the various business opportunities in the customer communication domain, cross-border transactions, mortgages, digital assets, green loans, and achieving carbon net zero through Metaverse. The role of Innovation Leaders is discussed in detail assisting readers to understand and appreciate the value of innovation in today’s rapidly changing technology times. The paper argues that banks must take a proactive role in driving the adoption of Metaverse, support circular economy, and reduce waste by enabling web3.0 technology in the banking sector.

Authors unavailable

Buyers have a lot of options these days with the rapid advent of modern centralized marketplaces which harness the internet as their main infrastructure. While convenience is provided in abundance, some major concerns with these platforms are the lack of data privacy, its power to obstruct vendors/merchants and the expenses for arbitrary reasons related with posting and selling of the items. In this work, the framework for an application is put forward by us, which benefits off of the Ethereum blockchain to address these issues. After the abstract is read by the user through the medium of a web interface, their input is sent to the Ethereum network using the web3.js API. Resolution of these security issues can be attempted by leveraging the blockchain technology and executing a DApp(Decentralized application) which will act as a virtual commercial centre wherein consumers will actually be able to trade digital resources or NFT's utilizing crypto tokens.