Blockchain Papers

Saleh Atiewi, Amer Al‐Rahayfeh, Muder Almiani, Abdullah Abuhussein · 5 authors

No abstract is available for this record.

N Aparna, R Kesavamoorthy

In recent times, the proliferation of fake certificates has become a growing concern, undermining the credibility of educational and professional qualifications. This paper presents a system based on blockchain designed to avoid the issuance and circulation of counterfeit certificates using Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs). Using the unchangeable and see-through nature of blockchain technology, the proposed system ensures secure verification and authentication of certificates. By employing NFTs, each certificate is tokenized, making it unique, indivisible, and tamper-resistant. The system provides a robust and trustworthy platform for institutions, employers, and individuals to eradicate the menace of fake certificates, promoting trust and integrity in the certification ecosystem.

Firas Hamila, Mohammad Hamad, Daniel Costa Salgado, Sebastian Steinhorst

Abstract With the rapid expansion of IoT devices and their applications, there is an increasing demand for efficient and secure authentication mechanisms to protect against unauthorized access. Traditional authentication mechanisms face limitations regarding computational speed, communication costs, and vulnerability to cyber-attacks. Zero-knowledge proof (ZKP) protocols have emerged as an effective solution for achieving secure and efficient authentication in such environments without revealing sensitive information. Among ZKP protocols, $$\Sigma $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>Σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -protocols, a class of interactive ZKP protocols, have been employed for their efficiency and security. However, their interactive nature necessitates multiple rounds of communication, which can reduce efficiency and increase communication overhead for resource-constrained devices. Many works have aimed to eliminate the interaction of $$\Sigma $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>Σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -protocols by utilizing a transformation called the Fiat–Shamir transformation (FST). However, there is still a concern regarding the soundness of the FST as it can sometimes convert a secure $$\Sigma $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>Σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -protocol into an insecure non-interactive zero-knowledge (NIZK) authentication scheme. In this paper, we propose an approach for transforming $$\Sigma $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>Σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -protocols into a NIZK protocol based on the FST, yielding significant enhancements in efficiency, communication overhead reduction, and elimination of interaction. Our proposed protocol enables the completion of the authentication process in a single request while also strengthening the soundness of $$\Sigma $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>Σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -protocols in comparison with the traditional FST by requiring two authentication factors instead of one. To demonstrate our approach’s robustness, we conducted comprehensive informal and formal security analyses (using the Tamarin-Prover). Our protocol demonstrated completeness, soundness, zero-knowledge properties, and robustness against attacks, including eavesdropping, message modification, replay, and brute force attacks. Additionally, our performance analysis displayed a remarkable 50% improvement in computational cost compared to traditional $$\Sigma $$ <mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mml:mi>Σ</mml:mi> </mml:math> -protocols, underscoring its efficiency for practical use.

Geetanjali Rathee, R. Maheswar, Sountharrajan Sehar, Durga Prasad Bavirisetti

The Internet of Things (IoT) is evolving in various sectors such as industries, healthcare, smart homes, and societies. Billions and trillions of IoT devices are used in e-health systems, known as the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT), to improve communication processes in the network. Scientists and researchers have proposed various methods and schemes to ensure automatic monitoring, communication, diagnosis, and even operating on patients at a distance. Several researchers have proposed security schemes and approaches to identify the legitimacy of intelligent systems involved in maintaining records in the network. However, existing schemes have their own performance issues, including delay, storage efficiency, costs, and others. This paper proposes trusted schemes that combine mean and subjective logic aggregation methods to compute the trust of each communicating device in the network. Additionally, the network maintains a blockchain of legitimate devices to oversee the trusted devices in the network. The proposed mechanism is further verified and analyzed using various security metrics, such as reliability, trust, delay, beliefs, and disbeliefs, in comparison to existing schemes.

Bofeng Pan, Natalia Stakhanova, Zhongwen Zhu

Advances in blockchain technology have attracted significant attention across the world. The practical blockchain applications emerging in various domains, ranging from finance, healthcare, and entertainment, have quickly become attractive targets for adversaries. The novelty of the technology coupled with the high degree of anonymity it provides made malicious activities even less visible in the blockchain environment. This made their robust detection challenging. This article presents EtherShield, a novel approach for identifying malicious activity on the Ethereum blockchain. By combining temporal transaction information and contract code characteristics, EtherShield can detect various types of threats and provide insight into the behavior of contracts. The time-interval-based analysis used by EtherShield enables expedited detection, achieving comparable accuracy to other approaches with significantly less data. Our validation analysis, which involved over 15,000 Ethereum accounts, demonstrated that EtherShield can significantly expedite the detection of malicious activity while maintaining high accuracy levels (86.52% accuracy with 1 hour of transaction history data and 91.33% accuracy with 1 year of transaction history data).

Alexandr Kuznetsov, Emanuele Frontoni, V. A. Katrich, Olena Kobylianska · 5 authors

Existing digital identification systems are often vulnerable to attacks as they are commonly based on authentication methods such as passwords, PIN codes, biometric data, etc., which can be easily forged or compromised. In this letter, we propose a digital identification system based on a unique set of user biometric data processed by Artificial Intelligence (AI) and fuzzy extractors to generate a cryptographically secure password linked to a unique Non-Fungible Token (NFT). Our system provides decentralized identification based on blockchain technology, which eliminates problems associated with centralized identification systems, such as cyber-attacks on central servers and data leaks. Our proposed system offers a higher level of user identification security by linking the user to their data through a unique NFT, generating a cryptographically secure password, and processing large volumes of biometric data using AI and fuzzy extractors. Our system provides a solution to many of these problems, making it important and relevant to many industries, including banking, medical, and financial sectors. The use of decentralized storage of information on the blockchain provides a high level of protection against hacking and reduces the likelihood of data breaches, making our system particularly relevant in the field of financial services and personal data protection.

Imen Hagui, Amina Msolli, Noura Ben Henda, Abdelhamid Helali · 7 authors

No abstract is available for this record.

Xia Feng, XiaoFeng Wang, Kaiping Cui, Qingqing Xie · 5 authors

Real-time and interactive traffic information sharing systems are crucial in the Internet of Vehicles (IoV) as they enable vehicles to make informed decisions, thereby improving the efficiency of intelligent transportation systems (ITS). Message authentication ensures the accuracy, integrity, and tamper-resistance of information in IoV. Existing schemes aim to achieve time-critical message authentication . However, these schemes are time-consuming and cannot meet the real-time requirements of IoV. Additionally, there are issues with latency in data synchronization and data redundancy when vehicles traverse different domains. We propose an efficient, distributed, and resistant-to-malicious-attacks authentication scheme based on the reputation mechanism. Our scheme supports batch verification, enabling fast authentication. By leveraging the decentralized and ledger-synchronized features of blockchain , our distributed scheme reduces data redundancy. We also employ a reputation mechanism to ensure reliable reports in IoVs. We experimentally confirm that our scheme outperforms EADA (59.73%), RCoM (76.35%), MLGSDT (63.36%), and TRAJ (82.08%). This approach provides a secure and reliable solution for report authentication.

Yunpeng Xiao, B. Deng, Siqi Chen, Zhixuan Zhou · 7 authors

Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) are decentralized digital tokens to represent the unique ownership of items. Recently, NFTs have been gaining popularity and at the same time bringing up issues, such as scams, racism, and sexism. Decentralization, a key attribute of NFT, contributes to some of the issues that are easier to regulate under centralized schemes, which are intentionally left out of the NFT marketplace. In this work, we delved into this centralization-decentralization dilemma in the NFT space through mixed quantitative and qualitative methods. Centralization-decentralization dilemma is the dilemma caused by the conflict between the slogan of decentralization and the interests of stakeholders. We first analyzed over 30,000 NFT-related tweets to obtain a high-level understanding of stakeholders' concerns in the NFT space. We then interviewed 15 NFT stakeholders (both creators and collectors) to obtain their in-depth insights into these concerns and potential solutions. Our findings identify concerning issues among users: financial scams, counterfeit NFTs, hacking, and unethical NFTs. We further reflected on the centralization-decentralization dilemma drawing upon the perspectives of the stakeholders in the interviews. Finally, we gave some inferences to solve the centralization-decentralization dilemma in the NFT market and thought about the future of NFT and decentralization.

Sherif Hamdy Gomaa Salem, Ashraf Yehia Hassan, Marwa S. Moustafa, Mohamed Nabil Hassan

Abstract In recent years, face biometrics recognition systems are a wide space of a computer usage which is mostly employed for security purpose. The main purpose of the face biometrics recognition system is to authenticate a user from a given database. Due to the widespread expansion of the surveillance cameras and facial recognition technology, a robust face recognition system required. The recognition system needs to store a large number of training samples in any storage unit, that time hackers can access and control that data. So, Protecting and managing sensitive data is essential object. This requires a technique that preserve the privacy of individuals, maintain data integrity, and prevent information leakage. The storage of biometric templates on centralized servers has been associated with potential privacy risks. To address this issue, we have developed and implemented a proof-of-concept facial biometric identification system that uses a private Blockchain platform and smart contract technology. So, the proposed approach is presented a secure and tamper-proof from data breaches as well as hacks with data availability, by using the Blockchain platform to store face images. This paper aims to utilize Blockchain technology to identify individuals based on their biometric traits, specifically facial recognition system makes it tamper-proof (immutable) ensuring security. The system consists of enrolment and authentication phases. Blockchain technology uses peer-to-peer communication, cryptography, consensus processes, and smart contracts to ensure the security. The proposed approach was tested on two popular datasets: CelebFaces Attributes (CelebA) and large-scale face UTKFace datasets. The experimental results indicate that the system yields highly performance outcomes, as evidenced by the Equal Error Rate (EER) values of 0.05% and 0.07% obtained for the CelebA and UTKFace datasets, respectively. The system was compared to three baseline methods and scored the lowest Equal Error Rate.

Faisal Mehmood, Umara Khalid, Shahid Karim

The challenge of safeguarding user data privacy becomes pronounced when private data is outsourced to cloud services, potentially exposing it to unauthorized access. The challenge of centralized storage of user data introduces heightened security risks and a dependence on a single authority, posing difficulties in safeguarding against internal breaches. This study is dedicated to advancing user privacy and data security, especially in scenarios involving the sharing of sensitive information within or across organizations, including small enterprises functioning in a distributed environment. The research introduces a consent management framework built on Blockchain technology, with a particular focus on user consent management. This framework is designed to prioritize the principles of privacy, security, scalability, and data integrity. It utilizes Hyperledger Fabric which is a permissioned distributed ledger solution, and incorporates Hyperledger Composer to establish and maintain a secure record of user data. To enhance the security of stored data, the framework incorporates the Interplanetary File System (IPFS) and employs a unique cryptographic public key encryption algorithm for data encryption. The overarching aim of this research is to establish a robust security solutions foundation against cyber threats by harnessing the inherent capabilities of blockchain technology, ultimately strengthening the security landscape for sharing user information.

Akshay Kumar, Geetanjali Rathee, Chaker Abdelaziz Kerrache, Muhammad Bilal · 5 authors

Consumer electronics devices, such as refrigerators, washing machines, TVs, smartphones, and household appliances, have become integral to human activities. However, these devices are vulnerable to security breaches and cyber-criminal threats, which can result in the theft and misuse of sensitive information. Existing security surveys and proposed schemes have encountered limitations in terms of redundancy and effectiveness. In this paper, we present a novel approach that ensures secure and transparent communication in consumer electronics. We introduce a multi-criterion decision-making model called TOPSIS, along with a weighted product model, to enhance the security and accuracy of the system. Furthermore, our proposed scheme employs a blockchain system for continuous tracking and monitoring of devices, ensuring accountability and surveillance of their past communications. Through comprehensive validation and verification against existing approaches using various security metrics, our proposed scheme demonstrates superior performance and effectiveness.

Shiqiang Zhang, Dongzhi Cao

No abstract is available for this record.

Pranay Kothari, Deepak Chopra, Manjot Singh, Shivam Bhardwaj · 5 authors

In today's world, secure and efficient biometric authentication is of keen importance. Traditional authentication methods are no longer considered reliable due to their susceptibility to cyber-attacks. Biometric authentication, particularly fingerprint authentication, has emerged as a promising alternative, but it raises concerns about the storage and use of biometric data, as well as centralized storage, which could make it vulnerable to cyber-attacks. In this paper, a novel blockchain-based fingerprint authentication system is proposed that integrates zk-SNARKs, which are zero-knowledge proofs that enable secure and efficient authentication without revealing sensitive biometric information. A KNN-based approach on the FVC2002, FVC2004 and FVC2006 datasets is used to generate a cancelable template for secure, faster, and robust biometric registration and authentication which is stored using the Interplanetary File System. The proposed approach provides an average accuracy of 99.01%, 98.97% and 98.52% over the FVC2002, FVC2004 and FVC2006 datasets respectively for fingerprint authentication. Incorporation of zk-SNARK facilitates smaller proof size. Overall, the proposed method has the potential to provide a secure and efficient solution for blockchain-based identity management.

Hind Idrissi, Paolo Palmieri

No abstract is available for this record.

Dato Kavazi, Victor Smirnov, Sasha Shilina, Jonathan Shomroni · 7 authors

We present a novel 1 Human = 1 Node blockchain protocol which aims to overcome problems arising from plutocratic principles upon which Proof-of-Work (PoW) and Proof-of-Stake (PoS) heavily rely on. The advent of blockchain technology has led to a massive wave of different decentralized ledger technology (DLT) solutions. Projects such as Bitcoin and Ethereum managed to shift the paradigm of how to transact value in a decentralized manner, yet their core technologies give rise to a significant early adopters’ control bias and have led to financial systems flawed by massive inequality and centralization of power. In this paper we propose an alternative to modern decentralized financial networks by introducing the Humanode network. Humanode is a network safeguarded by cryptographically secure bio-authorized nodes on which users are able to deploy nodes by staking their encrypted biometric data. This approach can potentially lead to the creation of a truly public, permissionless financial network, based on consensus between equal human nodes with algorithmic emission mechanisms targeting real value growth and contribution-based wealth distribution.

Shashwat, Ravi Shankar Pandey

NFTs or non-fungible tokens are unique digital assets with identifiable characteristics. NFTs can take the form of digital art, GIFs, videos, collectibles, video game merchandise, music, and even tweets. Uniqueness of a digital asset encompasses more than just visual properties, but also factors such as item IDs and hash codes. This means that even though the two NFTs are visually indistinguishable, they have different IDs and codes. In the digital space, these elements are an integral part of an asset&s;s identity as they contain important data about the object&s;s history. The popularity of the Non-Fungible Token (NFT) has grown tremendously since 2020, becoming one of the most popular applications in the Fintech field. However there is still lack of platforms which provide all the functionalities regarding NFTs (including minting, buying and selling) at a single place. This research paper introduces an algorithm for creation of NFTs along with ensuring owner verification which can be used for minting the NFTs in an E-commerce website using the MOTOKO language for creation of canisters consisting the owner id for owner verification and the principal id which serves as a unique token id for the NFT.

Marko Jevtić, Sajjad Khan, Jorão Gomes, Davor Svetinović

This study explores the potential of blockchain-based product authentication systems in mitigating the proliferation of counterfeit luxury goods. By leveraging secure hardware and blockchain technology, these systems integrate unique identifier codes into product tags stored as blocks within a decentralized ledger. The key research question addressed in this paper is: To what extent are blockchain-enabled systems effective in reducing the prevalence of counterfeit luxury items in the marketplace? Despite the secure nature of blockchain technology and its ability to maintain the integrity of stored codes, there remains a critical challenge. Counterfeiters can still manipulate physical goods and imitate product tags, highlighting a disconnect between physical products and their digital counterparts. A comprehensive literature analysis will evaluate the proposed system's efficiency and the existing gap between physical and digital product authentication. The primary objective of this research is to delineate the system's architecture and elucidate its potential utility from an economic standpoint. The analysis aims to better understand the current challenges and potential solutions within blockchain-empowered luxury goods authentication.

Pouria Fatemi, Amir Kafshdar Goharshady

We propose a trustless blockchain-based protocol for secure and decentralized generation of secret random numbers. In our protocol, which can be implemented as a smart contract, a client Cassie can ask for a secret random number$r$. The protocol will then allow anyone on the blockchain network to contribute to the process of generating$r$, but crucially, only Cassie would be able to see the final result. Additionally, our approach is auditable, i.e. if Cassie later wishes to announce her secret random number$r$, she can prove that the output of the process was indeed the claimed value. Finally, we ensure no one else is able to deduce$r$before Cassiediscloses it. A primary use-case of this approach is to enable auditable online gambling and casinos with verifiable and tamper-proof randomness. If Cassie is a casino, she can ask for a secret random number$r$at the beginning of the day, and then use it as a seed in a predefined pseudo-random number generator which is in turn used as the source of randomness for all bets during the day. At the end of the day, Cassie can prove that the seed was indeed generated by our decentralized protocol. Thus, she can prove that the casino had no control over the outcomes of the bets. Moreover, this is a cost- and time-efficient approach as it does not require us to generate a new random number for every bet.

Zhangyue Shi, Boris Oskolkov, Wenmeng Tian, Kan Chen · 5 authors

Abstract The advancement of sensing technology enables efficient data collection from manufacturing systems for monitoring and control. Furthermore, with the rapid development of the Internet of Things (IoT) and information technologies, more and more manufacturing systems become cyber-enabled, facilitating real-time data sharing and information exchange, which significantly improves the flexibility and efficiency of manufacturing systems. However, the cyber-enabled environment may pose the collected sensor data with high risks of cyber-physical attacks during the data and information sharing. Specifically, cyber-physical attacks could target the manufacturing process and/or the data transmission process to maliciously tamper the sensor data, resulting in false alarms or failures in anomaly detection in monitoring. In addition, cyber-physical attacks may also enable illegal data access without authorization and cause the leakage of key product/process information. Therefore, it becomes critical to develop an effective approach to protect data from these attacks so that the cyber-physical security of the manufacturing systems can be assured in the cyber-enabled environment. To achieve this goal, this paper proposes an integrative blockchain-enabled data protection method by leveraging camouflaged asymmetry encryption. A real-world case study that protects the cyber-physical security of collected sensor data in additive manufacturing is presented to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. The results demonstrate that malicious tampering could be detected in a relatively short time (less than 0.05 ms), and the risk of unauthorized data access is significantly reduced as well.

Aditya Sharma, Brijesh Kumar Chaurasia

No abstract is available for this record.

Sakshi, Arun Malik, Ajay K. Sharma

No abstract is available for this record.

Rosa Pericàs-Gornals, Macià Mut–Puigserver, M. Magdalena Payeras–Capellà, Miquel À. Cabot-Nadal · 5 authors

Digital credentials are being issued by authorized entities to facilitate the digital identification of their users. They can be classified in identity credentials, academic and professional credentials, and access credentials. Blockchain offers some inherent features that are highly advantageous for the management of credentials. Non-Fungible Tokens, or NFTs, might seem to be a perfect fit for the implementation of digital credentials. However, some crucial requirements for credentials are the non-transferability of the credential and that the authorized entity can receive explicit acceptance from the user who will own the new credential. Nevertheless, there is a new type of token, named Soulbound tokens (SBT), that has been designed to ensure the non-transferability of assets. This paper presents a protocol that is focused on the issuance of digital access credentials, with the additional ability to allow the association of terms and conditions that users must accept when receiving these credentials. We use an enhanced version of the SBTs, called RejSBTs, to represent the credentials and associated terms, providing non-repudiation of reception and origin proofs.

Miquel À. Cabot-Nadal, Brendan Playford, M. Magdalena Payeras–Capellà, Sebastian Gerske · 6 authors

The need for self-sovereign and privacy-preserving identity solutions is becoming more critical, due to increasing concerns about privacy and data security, especially when it involves highly sensitive Personally Identifiable Information (PII). In this article we propose a protocol based on blockchain technology, Soulbound tokens (SBT) and zero-knowledge proofs (ZKP) to address these challenges. By using the public key of the identity holder address to encrypt the data, our protocol can represent various identity attributes while ensuring privacy. We explore the concepts of self-sovereign and privacy-preserving identity and discuss the advantages of using blockchain-based SBTs and ZKPs in identity verification systems. Moreover, this article provides an overview of the state of the art in privacy-preserving identity using SBTs and ZKPs within the blockchain ecosystem, highlighting the potential benefits and future directions for this emerging field.