Mario A. Cypko, Charan Annadurai, Dominik Welte, Aditya Kumar · 6 authors
Abstract—The secure and controlled access to medical data is a critical challenge in modern clinical research. Regulatory frameworks such as the GDPR and the EU AI Act impose strict requirements on data access, privacy, and transparency, making conventional data-sharing processes inefficient and administratively burdensome. Our proposed HyperAccess platform aims to digitise and streamline the contractual access management of medical data through Hyperledger Fabric, an enterprise-grade, permissioned blockchain framework. The project introduces a semi-automated access control system that minimizes administrative efforts while maximizing trust among stakeholders, including data holders, data owners, and data users. By employing exclusive channels on Hyperledger Fabric, only stakeholders involved in an agreement are part of the dedicated channel. This paper presents the design principles, technological framework, and potential impact of HyperAccess on multicentre clinical research, offering a scalable, privacypreserving, and practically validated solution through an initial prototypical implementation.
S. Gheisari, Jaime Osvaldo Salas, Semih Yumuşak, George Konstantinidis
This paper presents MINiDM, a novel negotiation framework designed for decentralised data marketplaces. MINiDM enables AI-driven agents to negotiate complex, multi-issue data-sharing agreements while ensuring compliance with legal and ethical standards such as GDPR. The framework combines game-theoretic strategies, formal policy languages and vocabularies (ODRL and DPV), and a lightweight multi-agent commitment protocol to automate fair transactions without relying on central authorities or blockchain- based contracts. Experimental results demonstrate that MINiDM outperforms existing protocols in terms of agreement rate, fairness, and negotiation efficiency, offering a promising direction for secure and autonomous data trading in Web3 ecosystems.
With the growing integration of cloud computing and the increasing adoption of Internet-of-Things (IoT) devices, ensuring the integrity and privacy of data has become critical in digital systems. Data integrity is fundamental to maintain the completeness and reliability of data throughout the data lifecycle. Its importance is particularly evident in domains such as healthcare, where accurate diagnoses rely on trustworthy data. However, as systems evolve and become more complex, traditional centralised solutions often lack transparency and resilience, while resource-constrained devices make it more difficult to guarantee security and privacy. This thesis addresses these challenges by proposing a framework that integrates Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) to support privacy-preserving data sharing and strengthen trust among system stakeholders. Based on this framework, an architecture was designed with three main modules: a middleware integrator for service interoperability, an authorisation manager for fine-grained access control, and a data integrity validator leveraging metadata anchored on a distributed ledger to ensure compliance with the General Data Protection Regulation. A proof of concept was designed and implemented using IoT devices, healthcare data, and low-resource hardware. Experimental results demonstrate that the proposed solution enables efficient data sharing and integrity validation with minimal overhead on the system. The DLT layer validated the integrity of shared data through a metadata model while preserving user privacy. Furthermore, the access control mechanism supported scalable and granular authorisation policies, and the middleware facilitated interoperability across heterogeneous stakeholders. This work contributes to new insights into the security of digital systems and provides responsible entities with a trustworthy approach for sharing data among diverse entities.
Jan 1, 2025·Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Information Technology, Civil Innovation, Science, and Management, ICITSM 2025, 28-29 April 2025, Tiruchengode, Tamil Nadu, India, Part I
G. Sowmya Bala, P. S. G. Aruna Sri, Satyanarayana Korada, Suneel Gone
Traditional ticketing systems are at risk of fraud, counterfeiting, and issues concerning scalability. In this research, we investigate the application of blockchain technology towards the revolutionary concept of event tickets. We analyze how fundamental attributes of blockchain technology, such as
The web is evolving from centralized servers and trusted intermediaries toward decentralized systems that empower users to own their data, assets, and identities. Decentralized applications connect familiar frontend interfaces to blockchains and smart contracts, shifting trust from corporations to transparent, self-executing code.
Trust in democratic institutions has waned in recent years, stemming from insufficient transparency and representation in public decision-making processes, expanding social and wealth disparities, and growing apprehensions surrounding mis/disinformation fueled by the emergence of highly persuasive AI-generated content such as ChatGPT. Decentralized Web3 technologies such as blockchain emerged as instruments for creating an alternative “trustless” system that uses cryptography and decentralized consensus mechanisms to obviate the need for third party human intermediaries, but suffered significant setbacks due to massive frauds and speculations throughout the past decade of their evolution. Although it might appear counterintuitive to advocate for the potential benefits of these technologies in light of their evident failures, we assert that, before dismissing them, it is essential to differentiate the technological layer from the social layer in these instances and examine them with greater care and criticality. We argue that the recurrent failures of blockchain-based projects, as reported in the media and denounced by critics, are less indicative of the technology’s inherent weakness, and more a consequence of malicious actors exploiting the social layer within the system. What is thus heavily lacking in the current Web3 landscape is the collaborative development and innovation in the social and institutional layer to build systems that genuinely enhance democracy and address the trust crisis society faces as a whole in a more sustainable way through leveraging the capabilities offered by decentralized technologies. As such, rather than perceiving these technologies as decentralized trust-replacing technologies, we consider them as “Decentralized Trust-Building Technologies” (DTTs). DTTs do not seek to replace trust, but instead serve to fortify trust through transparent and secure mechanisms combined with robust institutional designs. In this report, we investigate a variety of case studies that showcase emerging efforts to employ DTTs in the physical realities and the built environment of our social institutions. These empirical examples offer valuable insights – both inspirational and cautionary lessons – into the practical applications of DTTs in transforming our society and lived environments. From this empirical analysis, our goal is to establish a set of guidelines and best practices for current and future endeavors in fostering innovation within this space, ultimately paving ways for more resilient and sustainable lived ecosystems that harness the power of DTTs.
Saad Mutlaq Alluhaydan, Mohammed Obaid Alshammari, Yousef Jazaa Obaid Alshmilan, Ahmed Hamoud Alshammari · 12 authors
Background: The rise of AI health assistants and digital tools raises concerns about data security and consent management. Traditional systems are prone to failures and provide limited transparency in data sharing. Blockchain technology offers a decentralized, immutable, and secure solution to these issues. Aim: This narrative review critically examines the real-world implementations and security trade-offs of blockchain technology when applied specifically to health assistant audit trails and consent management, moving beyond theoretical propositions. Methods: A systematic search of peer-reviewed literature (2010-2024) was conducted across Scopus, IEEE Xplore, PubMed, and ACM Digital Library. Implementation case studies, prototypes, and theoretical frameworks were analyzed to assess technical architectures, performance metrics, and security evaluations. Results: Findings indicate an emerging landscape where blockchain proves useful for creating secure audit logs in AI decision-making and dynamic consent models using smart contracts. However, challenges persist, including performance and scalability issues, key management complexities, data linkage risks, and conflicts between immutability and regulatory requirements such as the GDPR's "right to be forgotten." Conclusion: Blockchain serves as a foundational layer to improve security and transparency in health assistant ecosystems. Its future potential relies on hybrid architectures, advanced cryptographic methods such as zero-knowledge proofs, and an awareness of the new security and operational challenges that arise. It is not merely a database but a comprehensive solution for integrity and control.
Identification, authentication, and authorization processes can be conducted in various ways. Particular attention is given to the processes implemented within the self-sovereign identity paradigm. This paper analyses the processes from a data leak perspective. A comparison is made between self-sovereign identity and a centralized identity provider scheme. An overview of the relevant implementations for these processes is provided: in both the self-sovereign and non-sovereign paradigms. It has been found that, from the data leaks perspective, the self-sovereign identity scheme could only provide superior security if zero-knowledge proof technology is applied.
Chunyu Lu, Jun Luo, Duo Shang, Haoran Li · 8 authors
This paper proposes a novel cross-domain access control mechanism for industrial Internet alliance chains using zero-knowledge proof (ZKP). The mechanism integrates ZKP with blockchain technology to achieve secure, privacy-preserving, and decentralized access control across multiple industrial domains. A formal system model and security framework are presented, along with an efficient ZKP protocol for attribute-based access control. The proposed scheme is implemented using smart contracts and distributed ledger technology. Comprehensive performance analysis and security verification demonstrate the mechanism’s high throughput, low latency, and resilience against various security threats. Experimental results show that the proposed solution is scalable and practical for large-scale industrial Internet scenarios, enabling secure data sharing and collaboration while protecting user privacy and ensuring fine-grained access control.
In Web 3.0’s pursuit of a decentralized and user-autonomous network, traditional access control methods, such as central servers and weak decentralized algorithms, are insufficient regarding security, fault tolerance ability, and scalability. To solve this, we first design a decentralized multi-committee attribute-based encryption, X-ABE, to address the weak decentralization and low fault tolerance in Multi-Authority Attribute-Based Encryption (MA-ABE). X-ABE replaces MA-ABE’s fragile attribute authorities with robust attribute committees, each composed of multiple nodes. By developing dual-wrapped shares techniques, we address the increased dimensionality challenge of secret sharing while maintaining only 1 distributed key generation instance. Also, a formal security definition and proof under the partial adaptive model are given using dual system encryption. Second, X-LOCK, an X-ABE based decentralized access control utilizing consensus plus sharding, is proposed for Web 3.0, to achieve full decentralization, consistency, fault tolerance, user autonomy, and scalability. Third, X-ABE-R is proposed for attribute revocation and is demonstrated in X-LOCK-R with sharding blockchain as an immutable revocation ledger. Fourth, a formal definition and comparative analysis of X-ABE’s fault tolerance abilities are demonstrated, covering aspects of liveness and safety, along with the complexity analysis. Fifth, practical evaluations are conducted, demonstrating that while improving fault tolerance, the overhead remains acceptable.
Yalan Wang, Liqun Chen, Long Meng, Christopher J. P. Newton
Concerns about how third parties manage personal information have led to the development of decentralized identities (DIDs) and verifiable credentials (VCs). The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) working group has been developing standards for DIDs and VCs. In the W3C standards, a DID identifies an entity (a DID holder) and a VC confirms that this DID holder has some associated attributes. A DID holder can obtain many VCs and confirm any number of these VCs to others (verifiers) in verifiable presentations (VPs). In order to keep a holder’s identity and attributes private, it is necessary to achieve anonymous VPs that allows this information to be kept confidential. The W3C working group recommends using randomizable signatures to create VCs with zero-knowledge proofs for this purpose. However, the anonymous VPs provided by the this method are limited that in the real world, credentials in cross domains cannot be universally verified. To overcome this limitation, in this paper, we propose a new scheme, called Verifiable Credentials with anonymous DIDs (VCaDID), which aims to achieve anonymous VPs in cross-domain settings. The main technique in our VCaDID scheme is a ring signature with multiple attributes by hiding a holder’s public key among a ring of holders. In our scheme, we set private keys associated with the holder’s DID and attributes, which allow the holder to anonymously present these credentials in a verifiable way. We also prove that the proposed VCaDID scheme satisfies correctness, anonymity and unforgeability under security assumptions of discrete log and random oracle model. Finally, we implement our scheme to demonstrate its feasibility.
Voting is a cornerstone of collective participatory decision-making in contexts ranging from political elections to decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). Despite the proliferation of internet voting protocols promising enhanced accessibility and efficiency, their evaluation and comparison are complicated by a lack of standardized criteria and unified definitions of security and maturity. Furthermore, socio-technical requirements by decision makers are not structurally taken into consideration when comparing internet voting systems. This paper addresses this gap by introducing a trust-centric maturity scoring framework to quantify the security and maturity of seventeen internet voting systems. A comprehensive trust model analysis is conducted for selected internet voting protocols, examining their security properties, trust assumptions, technical complexity, and practical usability. In this paper we propose the Internet Voting Maturity Framework (IVMF) which supports nuanced assessment that reflects real-world deployment concerns and aids decision-makers in selecting appropriate systems tailored to their specific use-case requirements. The framework is general enough to be applied to other systems, where the aspects of decentralization, trust, and security are crucial, such as digital identity, Ethereum layer-two scaling solutions, and federated data infrastructures. Its objective is to provide an extendable toolkit for policy makers and technology experts alike that normalizes technical and non-technical requirements on a univariate scale.
Blockchain and the InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) are two decentralized technologies poised to revolutionize data storage, management, and sharing. Blockchain is a distributed ledger technology offering secure, transparent record-keeping and reduced transaction costs. IPFS is a decentralized file storage system designed to mitigate issues like censorship and data loss, using content addressing for improved speed and reliability. Integrating blockchain and IPFS can create powerful systems, such as decentralized marketplaces for file storage and sharing. This integration can eliminate intermediaries, enhance transparency, and bolster security. This paper explores the potential of these technologies, their individual strengths, and their combined impact on creating more secure, transparent, and efficient data management systems, benefiting individuals, organizations, and society.
Currently, privacy protection in consortium blockchains can be categorized into two primary schemes based on their characteristics. The first is the ring signature scheme, which renders the user identity completely anonymous. The second is the group signature scheme, where the user identity can be fully traced by the trusted authority (OA) in the event of a transaction dispute. To address the imbalance between privacy and accountability in consortium blockchain transactions, this paper introduces an enhanced multi-Key Generation Center (multi-KGC) group signature scheme tailored for consortium chains. We validate the anonymity and unforgeability of the proposed scheme through a security game. The enhanced group signature algorithm employs the Groth-Sahai proof system for non-interactive zero-knowledge proofs (NIZK) and leverages elliptic curve cryptography combined with threshold cryptography for key generation. This scheme is implemented within the Hyperledger Fabric consortium chain environment, and both computational and communication overheads are thoroughly analyzed. Experimental results indicate that, while the signature generation efficiency of the proposed scheme is slightly reduced compared to existing group signature schemes, its verification efficiency aligns with similar schemes. Functionally, our scheme facilitates a tiered disclosure of signing user information based on transaction values during transaction audits in consortium blockchain transactions.
Blockchain technology has become a foundational component for constructing decentralized, secure, and immutable distributed systems. The consensus mechanism ensures that all nodes in a blockchain network reach agreement on a single version of truth, thereby maintaining data consistency across the distributed ledger. The earliest blockchain application, Bitcoin, adopts Proof of Work (PoW), which provides high security at the cost of substantial computational power and energy consumption. Ethereum employs Proof of Stake (PoS) to reduce energy consumption, though it introduces new challenges in the fairness of node selection. Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance (PBFT) has gained significant attention for its ability to achieve more efficient consensus by reducing computational and energy demands. However, traditional PBFT still requires extensive message exchanges and voting among nodes, leading to significant communication overhead in large-scale networks. To address these limitations and further enhance the performance of PBFT, we propose the Comprehensive Trust-based PBFT (CTPBFT) algorithm. CT-PBFT reduces communication overhead by excluding nodes with low trust scores from the consensus process, thereby optimizing overall efficiency. We conducted a thorough analysis and simulation of CT-PBFT, and the results demonstrate that CT-PBFT outperforms traditional PBFT in terms of consensus latency and throughput. Moreover, CT-PBFT is more effective than other trust-based PBFT variants in swiftly eliminating Byzantine nodes, providing a robust and efficient solution for secure communication in distributed systems.
There have been many attacks threatening the security of LMD-GHOST, the consensus protocol adopted in Ethereum 2.0. Therefore, a consensus protocol which is provably secure is needed. The existing work "Goldfish" is provably secure but requires 3Δ rounds per slot, with Δ being the maximum network delay. In this study, we propose a provably secure protocol with a structure of 2Δ rounds per slot by parallelizing the block proposal phase and the voting phase in Goldfish. By reducing the number of rounds per slot, transaction processing speed increases, leading to enhancing scalability.
Saravanan Muthaiyah, Lan Thi Phuong Nguyen, Yap Voon Choong, Thein Oak Kyaw Zaw
This study addresses the inherent risk management challenges in decentralized finance, particularly for peer-to-peer (P2P) lending platforms. We propose a novel framework that leverages a Multi-Agent System (MAS) to establish a collaborative network encompassing loan originators, investors, regulators, and service providers. This distributed approach facilitates federated risk management, where risk assessment and mitigation responsibilities are shared across these entities. The MAS employs a comprehensive nine-factor assessment (detailed in Table 5) to evaluate industry risk profiles, considering industry environment, competition, and internal capabilities. This data is further visualized using a color matrix (Tables 5 & 6) and utilized alongside state diagrams (Figure 2) to depict the workflow and manage tasks within the P2P lending process. Additionally, the MAS informs a novel Federated Risk-Based Access Control (FRkBAC) system that tailors access permissions (lending origination, disbursement, etc.) based on dynamic risk assessments of industry trends and individual borrower profiles. This data-driven approach fosters trust within the P2P ecosystem and represents a significant advancement in decentralized finance risk management compared to traditional methods. Doi: 10.28991/ESJ-2024-08-06-05 Full Text: PDF