Vincenzo De Maio, Rafael Brundo Uriarte, Ivona Brandić
In Vehicular Ad-hoc NETworks (VANET) users do not necessarily trust each other and in some cases they may introduce dubios information in the network. Centralized approaches to improve the credibility of information do not easily scale, require trusting the service provider and have higher network delay. Blockchain solutions are promising in the area but they need consensus on the credibility of new information, which requires the participants solve computational puzzles in a competitive manner. To cope with vehicles' limited computational resources and mobility, we propose brokerage mechanism to decide whether to execute the validation locally, or to offload it to an edge or cloud infrastructure. We define a Satisfiability Modulo Theories (SMT) method to enable participants to decide whether to take part in the validation and whether to offload it considering the state of the infrastructure, energy efficiency, the offloading cost and the computation reward. Our method obtains 77.7% higher profit and consumes 39.2% less energy in comparison with the case where no offloading is allowed.
Peter Mell, Aurélien Delaitre, Frederic de Vaulx, Philippe Dessauw
Previous work presented a theoretical model based on the implicit Bitcoin specification for how an entity might issue a protocol native cryptocurrency that mimics features of fiat currencies. Protocol native means that it is built into the blockchain platform itself and is not simply a token running on another platform. Novel to this work were mechanisms by which the issuing entity could manage the cryptocurrency but where their power was limited and transparency was enforced by the cryptocurrency being implemented using a publicly mined blockchain. In this work we demonstrate the feasibility of this theoretical model by implementing such a managed cryptocurrency architecture through forking the Bitcoin code base. We discovered that the theoretical model contains several vulnerabilities and security issues that needed to be mitigated. It also contains architectural features that presented significant implementation challenges; some aspects of the proposed changes to the Bitcoin specification were not practical or even workable. In this work we describe how we mitigated the security vulnerabilities and overcame the architectural hurdles to build a working prototype.
Open access
3 source records
cs.CR
Blockchain Technology Applications and Security
Advanced Steganography and Watermarking Techniques
Over the last decade there has been a continuing decline in social trust on the part of individuals with regards to the handling and fair use of personal data, digital assets and other related rights in general. At the same time, there has been a change in the employment patterns for many people through the emergence of the gig economy. These gig workers include artists, songwriters and musicians in the music industry. We discuss the notion of the data cooperative with fiduciary responsibilities to its members, which is similar in purpose to credit unions in the financial sector. A data cooperative for artists and musicians allows the community to share IT resources, such as data storage, analytics processing, blockchains and distributed ledgers. A cooperative can also employ smart contracts to remedy the various challenges currently faced by the music industry with regards to the license tracking management.
Swarm robotics is an emerging robotic domain that aims to accomplish complex tasks with the cooperative effort of a group of simple robots. These robots communicate and share information to coordinate their actions for achieving a common goal. However, existing mechanisms of control and communications are not very secure, efficient, and also rely on centralized controlling authority. It is not flexible, and also has low transparency and tracking capabilities. Blockchain, a decentralized technology based on peer to peer communication along with smart contracts, can be a potential contender for addressing these challenges. However, blockchains are resource‐intensive and not found suitable for resource‐constrained devices. We propose a blockchain‐based framework, which is based on Proof‐of‐Authority (PoA) consensus mechanism to ensure efficiency. We experiment with test‐bed implementation using RaspberryPi. The results obtained demonstrate that the PoA mechanism is not a resource‐hungry one (unlike other state‐of‐the‐art consensus mechanisms). The blockchain with PoA in swarm robotics can provide the necessary security, transparency, decentralization, reliability, autonomy, etc.
The agent based approach is a well established methodology to model distributed intelligent systems. Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) are increasingly employed in applications dealing with safety and information critical tasks (e.g., in eHealth, financial, and energy domains). Therefore, transparency and the trustworthiness of the agents and their behaviors must be enforced. For example, employing reputation based mechanisms can promote the development of trust. Nevertheless, besides recent early stage studies, the existing methods and systems are still unable to guarantee the desired accountability and transparency adequately. In line with the recent trends, we advocate that combining blockchain technology (BCT) and MAS can achieve the distribution of the trust, removing the need for trusted third parties (TTP), potential single points of failure. This paper elaborates on the notions of trust, BCT, MAS, and their integration. Furthermore, to attain a trusted environment, this manuscript details the design and implementation of a system reconciling MAS (based on the Java Agent DEvelopment Framework (JADE)) and BTC (based on Hyperledger Fabric). In particular, the agents’ interactions, computation, tracking the reputation, and possible policies for disagreement-management are implemented via smart contracts and stored on an immutable distributed ledger. The results obtained by the presented system and similar solutions are also discussed. Finally, ethical implications (i.e., opportunities and challenges) are elaborated before concluding the paper.
Marcelo Jasmim Meiriño, Mírian Picinini Méxas, Alexandre do Valle Faria, Rodrigo Picinini Méxas · 5 authors
Goal: The objective of this article is to raise the state of the art of the applications of blockchain described in the scientific literature.
 Design/methodology/approach: A bibliographic research on the Scopus database was carried out from November, 2017 to May, 2018, supported by the scientific research technique called Bibliometry. The compilation of 102 articles found in the scientific literature were presented in the Blockchain context, providing a reference for the fields of blockchain applications.
 Results: The results indicate a large increase in the number of articles published since 2017, the largest number of publications were written by authors affiliated with institutions located in China, as well as the most referenced applications are related to cryptocurrencies, smart contracts and IoT.
 Limitations of the investigation: The limitation lies in using only the Scopus database for bibliometry, despite being a renowned scientific base.
 Practical implications: This study can serve as a bibliographic reference with a global view of the main Blockchain applications that can be applied by different types of organizations
 Originality/value: Blockchain is a technology that aims to securely store data, such as financial data, contracts, proof of identity, documents of possession, medical information, etc. To do so, a framework based on laws of mathematics and cryptography is used to ensure the security of transactions of different applications, such as Bitcoin, which is a digital currency that guarantees the safe transfer of financial data. However, being a new technology, there is still little research on the subject. On the other hand, there are different types of applications that are already benefiting from the blockchain structure.
Provenance and traceability are crucial in the food distribution and transportation network for ensuring integrity of food labeling and efficient management of quality and contamination issues. Significant issues in terms of cost, quality, and health issues can result without sufficient visibility. This article elaborates on the use of emerging blockchain technology to improve Internet of Things-enabled food logistics.
We introduce Unity Interleave, a new consensus algorithm for public blockchain settings. It is an eventual consistency protocol merging the Proof-of-Work (PoW) and Proof-of-Stake (PoS) into a coherent stochastic process. It builds upon research previously done for the Unity protocol, improving security while maintaining fairness and scalability.
Felix Kohlbrenner, Pezhman Nasirifard, Christian Löbel, Hans‐Arno Jacobsen
Self-driving cars rely on several services to operate, some of which require financial interactions, such as paying for parking spaces or paying for battery charging in the case of the electric vehicles. Providing these services demands the cooperation of several parties and organizations that do not necessarily trust each other. Over the past few years, several blockchain-based services have been introduced to enable users with a safe and secure medium for conducting business in a trustless environment. In this work, we propose a blockchain-based solution to enable vehicles to consume and pay for services.
Yinqiu Liu, Kun Wang, Kai Qian, Miao Du · 5 authors
With the widespread applications of the Internet of Things (IoT), e.g., smart city, business, healthcare, etc., the security of data and devices becomes a major concern. Although blockchain can effectively enhance the network security and achieve fault tolerance, the huge resource consumption and limited performance of data processing restrict its deployments in IoT scenarios. Observing the heterogeneity and resource constraints, we intend to make blockchain accommodate both wimpy and brawny IoT devices. In this article, we present Tornado, a high-performance blockchain system based on space-structured ledger and corresponding algorithms, to enable blockchain in IoT. Specifically, we first design a space-structured chain architecture with novel data structures for promoting the network scalability. To address the huge heterogeneity of IoT, a novel consensus mechanism named collaborative-proof of work is developed. Moreover, we propose the space-structured greedy heaviest-observed subtree (S2GHOST) protocol for improving the resource efficiency of IoT devices. Additionally, a dynamic weight assignment mechanism in S2GHOST contributes to reflect the trustworthiness of data and devices. Extensive experiments demonstrate that Tornado can achieve a maximum throughput of 3464.76 transactions per second. The optimizations of propagation latency and resource efficiency are 68.14% and 30.56%, respectively.
Eman Daraghmi, Yousef‐Awwad Daraghmi, Shyan‐Ming Yuan
Although blockchain technology was first introduced through Bitcoin, extending its usage to non-financial applications, such as managing academic records, is a new mission for recent research to balance the needs for increasing data privacy and the regular interaction among students and universities. In this paper, a design for a blockchain-based system, namely UniChain, for managing Electronic Academic Records (EARs) is proposed. UniChain is designed to improve the current management systems as it provides interoperable, secure, and effective access to EARs by students, universities, and other third parties, while keeping the students’ privacy. UniChain employs timed-based smart contracts for governing transactions and controlling access to EARs. It adopts advanced encryption techniques for providing further security. This work proposes a new incentive mechanism that leverages the degree of universities regarding their efforts on maintaining academic records and creating new blocks. Extensive experiments were conducted to evaluate the UniChain performance, and the results indicate the efficiency of the proposal in handling a large dataset at low latency.
Charles Tim Batista Garrocho, Célio Márcio Soares Ferreira, Ailton Sávio Sacramento Júnior, Carlos Frederico Marcelo da Cunha Cavalcanti · 5 authors
Through the Internet of Industrial Things, significant investments in the industry are expected. In this new environment, machine-to-machine communication showed immediate potential. However, most communication implementations require a trusted intermediary. The introduction of smart contracts can enable communication without the need for a trusted intermediary. To provide security and decentralization in industrial communication processes, smart contract-based middleware is proposed. This proposal is evaluated for impacts against the stringent communication requirements required by industrial applications. Experimental results show that while this approach offers greater security and decentralization than traditional proposals, blockchain-based smart contracts cannot yet be applied to industrial systems due to blocking time.
The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) plays an indispensable role in Industry 4.0. People are committed to a universal, scalable, and secure IIoT system for use in a variety of industries. However, existing IIoT systems are not prone to provide stable services due to single points of failure and malicious attacks. In the era of big data, countless machines and equipment are generating data all the time, which can be used for scientific research, commodity production, and improving the efficiency of industrial development. Since the Internet of Things (IoT) connects all the smart machines together, ensuring data integrity is of great significance. How to ensure and detect the data integrity of the IoT is a topic of concern. This paper designs and implements a distributed blockchain data simulation system for data integrity assurance and detection in the context of IIoT applications. A method for assuring and detecting the integrity of IoT data is presented. A complete simulation system of IoT data based on blockchain is designed and implemented. The time consumed in the block mining process under different parameters is measured, and the correlation between the block mining time and different parameters is found, and the law of the influence of different parameters on the block mining time is obtained.
Iván Froiz-Míguez, Paula Fraga‐Lamas, José Varela-Barbeito, Tiago M. Fernández‐Caramés
The latest advances in the different Industry 4.0 technologies have enabled the automation and optimization of complex tasks of production processes thanks to their ability to monitor and track the state of physical elements like machinery, environmental sensors/actuators or industrial operators. This paper focuses on the latter and presents the design and evaluation of a system for monitoring industrial workers that provides a near real-time decentralized response system aimed at reacting and tracing events that affect operator personal safety and health. Such a monitoring system is based on the information collected from sensors encapsulated in IoT wearables that are used to measure both personal and environmental data. The communications architecture relies on LoRaWAN, an LPWAN (Low-Power Wide-Area Network) technology that offers good reliability in harsh communications environments and that provides relatively long distance communications with low-energy consumption. Specifically, each wearable sends the collected information (e.g., heart rate, altitude, external temperature, gas concentration, location) from the sensors to the nearest LoRaWAN gateway, which is transmitted to a pool of nodes where information is stored in a distributed manner. Such a decentralized system allows for providing information redundancy and guarantees its availability as long as there is an operative node. In addition, the proposed system is able to store and to process the collected data through smart contracts in a blockchain, which eliminate the need for a central backend and ensure the traceability and immutability of such data in order to share them with third parties (e.g., insurance companies or medical services).