Blockchain is one of the most popular topics for discussion now. However, most experts still see this technology as only part of Bitcoin, other crypto-currencies or money transfer systems. Often, new solutions, proposed by young researchers, are blocked by reviewers, only because these solutions can not be used for Bitcoins. However, Blockchain technology is more universal and can be used also in other areas, for example, in IoT, WSN and mobile devices. This paper considers the implementation of Blockchain technology in sensor networks as an element of IoT. The concept of "Rolling Blockchain" was proposed, which can be used to build WSN with the participation of Smart Cars, as nodes of the network. The order of block formation and structure in the chain is proposed and a mathematical model is created for it. We estimate the optimal number of WSN nodes, the number of connections between nodes, for specified network reliability values, was performed.
Muneer Maher A Al-shatir, Ahmed Sufyan Abdullah, Suhail Shareef
Cryptocurrency is considered a significant financial ground-breaking financial product which has led to a new revolution in financial market, affecting many countries and institutions globally, in both the economic and regulatory level. The huge impact of its existence can be seen by the enormous volume of borderless transactions, which occasionally overwhelming the economic size of some countries. The objective of this article is thus, to explore the reality of cryptocurrency focusing on Bitcoin as a case study. Besides, the article also aims to measure the efficiency of the currency technically and economically as to make assumptions on the probable impacts should it happen that the currency is adopted in main stream monetary system. Eventually, the article concludes that the adoption of the currency (bitcoin) may lead to inefficiency of the economy due to its nature of being overly exposed to the volatile market forces without any supervision. The adverse economic condition such as the risk of piracy and loss of rights, can also be expected as until currently there is no legal jurisdiction that guarantees the rights, apart of the presence of in the currency itself
Scanning of museum specimens has taken off. Using 3-D computed tomography (CT), specimens are scanned and, along with underlying digital data, are stored in online repositories, such as Digimorph, MorphoSource, iDigBio, and others. The material is made publicly available. But a host of legal questions have emerged, including ownership of scans, data, and the ability (or lack thereof) to copyright them. Do the people in possession of the specimen own it, and do they have permission to distribute the specimen for scanning? Who claims the rights to the digital data? Does a contract between the owning institution and the source of the specimen affect its digital reproduction and distribution? Tim White, director of collections and research, Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, notes: “…researchers will borrow something and then realize [they] want to have these specimens scanned…often at a third-party institution and the museum may only find out after the fact.” Does Yale own the specimen or is it on loan? Is there shared ownership by a written agreement? Who scanned the specimen—the borrowing institution or another organization that owns scanning equipment? According to David Bloom of VertNet, a National Science Foundation funded project, the loaning institution owns or manages the specimen, although the scan belongs to the borrower. Intellectual property attorney and former museum curator Amanda Nelson warns that it is not so simple. In the Yale example, much depends on the paperwork between the loaner and borrower. To avoid misunderstandings, Dirk Neumann of the Bavarian Natural History Collection, suggests the owner add “a specific section on the loan form that the borrower cannot get copyright ownership in his imaging but may use the images for his research purpose, so that there is a written proof of the borrower that he is author of the images but waives his copyright.” Doug Boyer, of Duke University and founder of the MorphoSource 3-D data and imagery repository, explains that museums have release forms that state what can be done with the specimen and may include a third-party clause that limits rights to distribute the data. In the United States, unlike in most European countries, medical scans cannot be copyrighted, as the copyright office does not judge them to have creative input. But Boyer suggests organizations assert copyright for their 3-D scans, many of which are derivative, posted in online repositories. Prepping and scanning a specimen for research involves value judgments and creativity to emphasize certain parts of its anatomy. Boyer thinks copyright should be applicable to research scans: “There's no question that at least the derivative images are copyrightable.” As attorney Nelson notes, “The bar for creativity has been set so low, sometimes just merely changing [or adding] colors…is a creative choice.” Patent attorney Sarita Pickett, of Mesmer & Deleault, explains that technology has changed so quickly “the laws have not always had time to catch up….” Copyright “clerks are unlikely to have the experience necessary to recognize when additional design elements are involved in activities that were previously entirely technological,” says Pickett. Part of the problem is how scientists describe their scans. Scientists put creative thought into designing and coloring a scan, “but when they describe what they did, they don’t use creative terms, leaning too heavily on the functionality aspect [showing frog bones]—as might be appreciated by another scientist.” To Boyer's knowledge, no scientists have registered copyright of their CT scans, but the MorphoSource group encourages researchers to assert copyright and ownership of their scans. The copyright issue will likely be determined in the courts, he added. A network of US-based museums and working groups is devising best practices and guidelines for archiving and sharing 3D data, and Boyer is optimistic that this will help museums share their collections globally. Data, too, are an issue. Nelson says, generally “data can’t be copyrighted.” Identifying tags on a specimen “cannot be copyrighted because that's information; that's fact.” The basis for this policy is that sharing the data is “for the benefit of society [as] a whole” for research and study. Some institutions want to maintain the open availability of data, although others want to limit what can be done with the data. The Creative Commons licensing mechanism can leave data or scans open to all, limit use, or claim copyright worldwide. Most data put online are for noncommercial use. But, warns Nelson Rios of Yale Peabody, “There's absolutely zero enforcement behind any of that…it's too complicated to pursue; also it's too expensive.” No matter what, Amanda Nelson points to the value of paperwork: “At the end of the day, it's who signed what and what does it say.” Myrna E. Watanabe (mewatanabeconsulting@gmail.com) is a science and grant writer in Patterson, New York.
Çalışmada gün geçtikçe popülerliği ve buna bağlı olarak toplam piyasa değerleri ve işlem hacimleri artan, çok sayıda ve çok çeşitli piyasalarda işlem gören kripto paraların fiyatlarının birbiri üzerindeki etkisi araştırılmıştır. Çalışmada, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Bitcoin Cash, Cardano, Litecoin, NEM, NEO, Stellar ve IOTA kripto paralarının seçiminde toplam piyasa değerleri dikkate alınmıştır ve en yüksek toplam piyasa değerine sahip 10 kripto para analize dahil edilmiştir. 15 Aralık 2017 ve 17 Ocak 2018 tarihleri arasında çalışmaya konu olan kripto paraların günlük fiyat hareketleri arasındaki ilişkiyi incelemek için serilere Johansen Eşbütünleşme Testi ve Granger Nedensellik Testi uygulanmıştır. Çalışmanın sonucunda, Cardano’nun NEO’nun Granger nedeni olduğu, Bitcoin’in Bitcoin Cash’in Granger nedeni olduğu, Litecoin’in Bitcoin Cash’in Granger nedeni olduğu, NEM’in Bitcoin Cash’in Granger nedeni olduğu, Ripple’ın Bitcoin’in Granger nedeni olduğu, NEO ve Ethereum’un birbirinin Granger nedeni olduğu, NEO ve Litecoin’in birbirinin Granger nedeni olduğu ve NEM’in Stellar’ın Granger nedeni olduğu tespit edilerek, bu değişkenlerin fiyat hareketlerinin kısa dönemde birbirini etkilediği ortaya konmuştur.
In the current article the legal nature and properties of the cryptocurrency phenomenon are disclosed through the analysis and comparison of the results of «judicial finding» of law that are recorded in the judicial acts. The author reveals, that judicial law of the different jurisdictions goes on the path of recognition of the bitcoin’s (and other cryptocurrencies) nature as the phenomenon that possesses the basic legal properties of money. It is established, that judges in the predominant majority use the following definitions for the characteristic of cryptocurrency: a decentralized currency; an asset that serves as a means of exchange and/or a measure of value; an anonymous digital currency; a virtual currency; an asset that serves as a means of payment; a digital production; an anonymized settlement system; a non–traditional money, etc. The author shows, that cryptocurrencies (in that sense in which they are interpreted in judicial law) have attributive properties that are inherent for the anthroposociocultural phenomena: cryptocurrencies are existentially rooted, they have a spontaneous and at the same time procedural character, they dynamically transformed into the universal phenomenon from the local phenomena, cryptocurrencies act as a natural way of self–regulation, distribution, redistribution and exchange of goods in society between its representatives, primarily in the private sector. The author substantiates the fundamental sense of the «judicial finding» of the legal nature and properties of cryptocurrency, which consists in the synthesis of the pluralistic nature of both crucial phenomena of social life – law and money: cryptocurrencies, as the phenomena that possess the qualities of money, act as the objects (subjects) of the factual life relations in which the question about the law raises. Thereby in the article it is once and again confirmed the full reliability and validity of one of the main Eugen Ehrlich’s theoretical and methodological conclusions, which he made more than a century ago – the conclusion about the poly–ontological nature of law, which is under no circumstances limited to the positive law and therefore cannot be narrowed to the positive legal norms.. Keywords: method of the judicial finding of law; nature of law; legal nature of cryptocurrency (bitcoin); legal properties of cryptocurrency (bitcoin). Received: 22.02.2018 Accepted: 23.03.2018 https://doi.org/10.31861/ehrlichsjournal2018.02.024
Bitcoin mining is a process that serves to both verify sets of transactions and slowly introduce new currency into the system. As a reward for performing this process, miners are paid in bitcoin for the blocks they mine. It was originally thought that there was no incentive in trying to subvert the mining protocol—in other words, there was no reason to believe that miners could be profitable by somehow cheating the system. As it turns out, a specific strategy called “selfish mining” was discovered to increase profitability for miners under certain conditions. This paper presents the selfish mining strategy, traverses a revenue model associated with the strategy, and then simulates the bitcoin network to see how this revenue model holds up under complicated network conditions. Specifically, the selfish mining revenue model typically assumes there is one selfish miner in the network—I simulate the more realistic case of there being many selfish miners in the network. We find that the revenue model can overestimate selfish miner revenues by up to 100% and underestimate them by up to 300% depending on network variables such as the number of selfish miners, the power of those miners, and network latency (the speed of block propagation from one miner to another).
Die Preisvorhersage ist eine der größten Herausforderungen der quantitativen Finanzierung. Diese Thesis stellt ein Neuronales Netz-Framework vor, das eine tiefgreifende maschinelle Lernlösung für das Preisvorhersageproblem bietet. Das Framework wird in drei Zeitpunkten mit einem Multilayer Perzeptron (MLP), einem einfachen Recurrent Neural Network (RNN) und einem Long Short Term Memory (LSTM) realisiert, die lange Abhängigkeiten lernen können. Wir beschreiben die Theorie der neuronalen Netze und des Deep Learning, um eine reproduzierbare Methode für unsere Anwendungen auf dem Kryptowährungsmarkt zu erstellen. Da die Preisvorhersage verwendet wird, um finanzielle Entscheidungen wie Handelssignale zu treffen, vergleichen wir verschiedene Ansätze des Vorhersageproblems, indem wir überwachte Lernmethoden in Klassifikationsaufgaben untersuchen. Wir untersuchen diese Modelle, um Preisrichtungen von wichtitgen Kryptowährungen außerhalb der Stichprobe mit einer rolling window regression Methode vorherzusagen. Für dieses Ziel erstellen wir ein Klassifikationsproblem, das voraussagt, ob der Preis jeder Kryptowährung als Grundlage für dreimonatige Handelsstrategien erheblich zu- oder abnimmt. Wir bauen verschiedene Handelsstrategien auf, basierend auf Long- oder Long- / Short-Positionen, die auf unseren Prognosen aufbauen, und vergleichen ihre Performance mit einer passiven Index-Investition auf dem Cryptowährungsmarkt, die CRIX (Trimborn and Härdle, 2016) folgt. Cryptocurrencies, Bitcoins sind die bekanntesten, basieren auf elektronischem Geld auf Blockchain-Technologie, die als eine dezentrale Alternative zu Währungen verwendet werden kann. Dank ihrer zahlreichen Anwendungen hat der Markt für Kryptowährung im Jahr 2017 ein exponentielles Wachstum erfahren. Wir vergleichen verschiedene gewichtete Portfolios, um zu testen, wie ein Anleger von fundamentalen Indikatoren wie der Marktkapitalisierung profitieren kann. Wir finden, dass LST die beste Genauigkeit für die Vorhersage von Richtungsbewegungen für die wichtigsten Kryptowährungen von CRIX hat und dass ein gleich gewichtetes Portfolio CRIX in den ersten Quartalen 2017 schlägt.
There are no solid arguments to sustain that digital currencies are the future of online payments or the disruptive technology that some of its former participants declared when used to face critiques. This paper aims to solve the cryptocurrency puzzle from a behavioral finance perspective by finding the parallelism between biases present in financial markets that could be applied to cryptomarkets. Moreover, it is suggested that cryptocurrencies' prices are driven by herding, hence this study test herding behavior under asymmetric and symmetric conditions and the existence of different herding regimes by employing the Markov-Switching approach.
Owing to Satoshi Nakamoto's brilliant idea, a P2P public ledger is shown to be implementable in anonymous network. Any Internet user can then join the anonymous network and contribute to the P2P public ledger by providing their computing power or proof-of-work. The proof-of-work is a clever implementation of one-CPU-one-vote by anonymous participants, and it protects the Bitcoin ledger from illegal modification. To compensate the nodes for their work, a cryptocurrency called Bitcoin is issued and given to nodes. However, the very nature of anonymity of the ledger and the cryptocurrency prevent the technology from being used in fiat money economy. Cryptocurrencies are not traceable even if they are used for money laundering or tax evasion, and the value of cryptocurrencies is not stable but fluctuates wildly. In this white paper, we introduce Gruut, a P2P ledger to implement a universal financial platform for fiat money. For this purpose, we introduce a new consensus algorithm called `proof-of-population,' which is one instance of `proof of public collaboration.' It can be used for multiple purposes; as a P2P ledger for banks, as a powerful tool for payment, including micropayment, and as a tool for any type of financial transactions. Even better, it distributes the profit obtained from transaction fee, currently dominated by a third party, to peers that cannot be centralized. Energy requirements of Gruut are so low that it is possible to run our software on a smartphone or on a personal computer without a graphic card.
We consider zero-knowledge proofs, a class of cryptographic protocols by which an agent (a Prover) can prove to another agent (a Verifier) that a statement is true without revealing any additional information. For example, a zero-knowledge proof allows one to prove knowledge of a password to somebody at the other end of the communication without actually revealing the password. \nWe present an introduction to and survey literature on zero-knowledge proofs, covering the history, formal definition, and classical applications of zero-knowledge proofs. In addition, we consider connections to complexity, demonstrating that all problems in the complexity class NP have zero-knowledge proofs, and also discuss more exotic applications of zero-knowledge, namely in electronic voting and nuclear disarmament. \nWe then consider applications of zero-knowledge to financial regulation, specifically in balancing transparency and confidentiality in financial reporting. Namely, we polled professionals in the financial industry to identify three major classes of regulatory problems. We then utilize zero-knowledge proofs to develop and present cryptographic protocols/mechanisms and solutions to these regulatory problems: (1) An employer verifying an employee has no financial holdings on a blacklist without revealing the other (allowed) holdings of the employee, (2) A fund convincing its investors that its holdings subscribe to particular risk constraints, without disclosing the actual holdings, (3) A collection of investors of a fund verifying aggregate information provided by the fund, while preserving pairwise anonymity. Applications (1) and (3) are novel applications developed in this paper, while (2) is drawn from [47].
For supporting the conceptualization and the management of enterprise models in a decentralized manner, this paper introduces an approach based on model versioning and blockchain technologies. The main contribution is twofold, consisting of a., the creation of models for inter-organizational business processes in a decentralized environment, and b., means for tracking process instances using meta-data at run time. Models for business processes, workflows, and instance states are collaboratively created as part of a decentralized architecture. Based on this approach, a hierarchical versioning and modeling approach is employed in order to create and manage public and private models in a transactional fashion. For forming relationships among decentralized participants, semi-formal models linked to a blockchain are suggested. The approach is evaluated with a supply chain use case and demonstrated in an implemented modeling tool.
Thomas Locher, Sebastian Obermeier, Yvonne-Anne Pignolet
The functionality that distributed ledger technology provides, i.e., an immutable and fraud-resistant registry with validation and verification mechanisms, has traditionally been implemented with a trusted third party. Due to the distributed nature of ledger technology, there is a strong recent trend towards using ledgers to implement novel decentralized applications for a wide range of use cases, e.g., in the financial sector and sharing economy. While there can be several arguments for the use of a ledger, the key question is whether it can fully replace any single trusted party in the system as otherwise a (potentially simpler) solution can be built around the trusted party. In this paper, we introduce an abstract view on ledger use cases and present two fundamental criteria that must be met for any use case to be implemented using a ledger-based approach without having to rely on any particular party in the system. Moreover, we evaluate several ledger use cases that have recently received considerable attention according to these criteria, revealing that often participants need to trust each other despite using a distributed ledger. Consequently, the potential of using a ledger as a replacement for a trusted party is limited for these use cases.
Akshaya Mani, Tavish Vaidya, David Dworken, Micah Sherr
Open proxies forward traffic on behalf of any Internet user. Listed on open proxy aggregator sites, they are often used to bypass geographic region restrictions or circumvent censorship. Open proxies sometimes also provide a weak form of anonymity by concealing the requestor's IP address. To better understand their behavior and performance, we conducted a comprehensive study of open proxies, encompassing more than 107,000 listed open proxies and 13M proxy requests over a 50 day period. While previous studies have focused on malicious open proxies' manipulation of HTML content to insert/modify ads, we provide a more broad study that examines the availability, success rates, diversity, and also (mis)behavior of proxies. Our results show that listed open proxies suffer poor availability--more than 92% of open proxies that appear on aggregator sites are unresponsive to proxy requests. Much more troubling, we find numerous examples of malicious open proxies in which HTML content is manipulated to mine cryptocurrency (that is, cryptojacking). We additionally detect TLS man-in-the-middle (MitM) attacks, and discover numerous instances in which binaries fetched through proxies were modified to include remote access trojans and other forms of malware. As a point of comparison, we conduct and discuss a similar measurement study of the behavior of Tor exit relays. We find no instances in which Tor relays performed TLS MitM or manipulated content, suggesting that Tor offers a far more reliable and safe form of proxied communication.
Blockchain and blockchain-related technologies are being rapidly invented to the point that it is difficult to define specifically which properties are necessary to constitute a blockchain. It may therefore seem far too early to meaningfully discuss the creation of international blockchain standards. This article will argue the opposite by summarising some existing international standards work related to blockchains, and propose directions for additional standards development that could meaningfully be explored in the near future without negatively impacting additional invention.
The subjects of information legal relations are investigated in the scientific article. The authorities of the State Fiscal Service of Ukraine (next – SFS of Ukraine) as a subject of information legal relations are separately considered. It is noted that the participation of the subjects of power authorities in information legal relations has its peculiarities, the main of which is the fact that the main prerequisite for the participation of such a subject in the information legal relationship is his competence.
Hirschman’s Exit/Voice conception has stimulated an extensive literature across many disciplines. Exit/Voice was designed to shine explanatory light on the responses of stakeholders in firms and states in moments of decline. We apply it here to the Bitcoin blockchain, where the Exit/Voice apparatus illuminates strange and unencountered qualities of the reactive choices open to the blockchain’s varied stakeholders.
Chao Qu, Ming Tao, Jie Zhang, Xiaoyu Hong · 5 authors
With the fast development of mobile Internet, Internet of Things (IoT) has been found in many important applications recently. However, it still faces many challenges in security and privacy. Blockchain (BC) technology, which underpins the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, has played an important role in the development of decentralized and data intensive applications running on millions of devices. In this paper, to establish the relationship between IoT and BC for device credibility verification, we propose a framework with layers, intersect, and self-organization Blockchain Structures (BCS). In this new framework, each BCS is organized by Blockchain technology. We describe the credibility verification method and show how it provide the verification. The efficiency and security analysis are also given in this paper, including its response time, storage efficiency, and verification. The conducted experiments have been shown to demonstrate the validity of the proposed method in satisfying the credible requirement achieved by Blockchain technology and certain advantages in storage space and response time.
Dear Editor, Since its initial popularization in 2008 as the underpinnings of the digital currency Bitcoin, blockchain has seen its implications spread beyond the financial industry.1 The field of dermatology presents promising potential applications for this burgeoning technology. Blockchain facilitates communication on a peer‐to‐peer platform with users sharing data directly with each other (Fig. 1). Computational algorithms ensure that the database is permanent, chronologically ordered and universally available on a network while remaining cryptographically secure. These attributes allow blockchain to remove intermediary costs, reduce manual errors and decrease risks of single points of failure.1 Potential implementation of blockchain technology in dermatology. (1) Dermatologists store encrypted patient data via blockchain. The stored data are securely distributed across the entire network of participating parties. (2) Data can be decrypted by participating parties and patients, using a private digital key. (3) Once decrypted, data can be used for various applications. Secure data storage and distribution are particularly useful for dermatology. Given our field's visual nature, digital imaging has become ubiquitous for documenting diseases, following patient progression and assessing treatment efficacy. With increasing image acquisition, needs for better standardization of imaging techniques and storage system interoperability have emerged.2 Blockchain offers the ideal solution. Encrypted images can be stored via blockchain, with image ownership and locations encoded as transactions. Every participating party could access data from other clinical practices, as long as patient permission and a secure digital decryption key were obtained. As information would be duplicated throughout the network – not backed up at individual institutions – this approach could reduce single‐site storage capacity needs. Patients could also access medical records via private digital keys, selectively sharing information while retaining data control. This model would eliminate burdens of printing patient records, physically transferring images or repeating unnecessary biopsies when patients change dermatologists. Patients could more easily obtain second opinions, grant viewership rights to guardians, or provide information for clinical research. Dermatologists would have enhanced focus on collaboration, care coordination and outcomes‐based care. Blockchain technology may also expedite machine learning advances in dermatology. Recent innovations highlight potential roles for artificial intelligence in skin cancer diagnosis.3 Allowing machine learning algorithms access to numerous images on a secure blockchain network would drive further optimization of computer‐assisted analysis. Importantly, blockchain would provide immutable trails between what the algorithms suggested and actual diagnoses, allowing for continuously learning feedback loops and improved diagnosis. A best practice for implementation of blockchain includes data encryption to ensure confidentiality. Speed and scalability are being addressed with ongoing research, and the cost‐effectiveness of implementation will also need to be explored.4 As these challenges are addressed, dermatology has the opportunity to lead other specialties in harnessing this emerging technology's potential to revolutionize the standardization, storage and distribution of information. Funding sources: None. Conflicts of interest: None to declare.
Alexander Chepurnoy, Vasily Kharin, Dmitry Meshkov
Turing-completeness of smart contract languages in blockchain systems is often associated with a variety of language features (such as loops). In opposite, we show that Turing-completeness of a blockchain system can be achieved through unwinding the recursive calls between multiple transactions and blocks instead of using a single one. We prove it by constructing a simple universal Turing machine using a small set of language features in the unspent transaction output (UTXO) model, with explicitly given relations between input and output transaction states. Neither unbounded loops nor possibly infinite validation time are needed in this approach.
This paper explores the predictive qualities of Bitcoin Miners Revenue on Bitcoin Returns. Using data on Bitcoin in the cryptocurrency market from July 1, 2010 to February 20, 2018, we reflect intervariable correlations not previously examined. We analyze those relationships with a conditional regression analysis adjusting for calendar effects. We separate the sample, and use the last 17 trading days (month) to test a strategy based on the probability of Bitcoin Returns moving higher. After a slight modification to the logistic regression analysis, we find a profitable trading strategy exists based solely on Bitcoin Miners Revenue and the probability of Bitcoin Returns moving higher.
Williams Kwasi Peprah, Amos Oppong Afriyie, Joseph Ahor Abandoh-Sam, Emmanuel Oppong Afriyie
Globalization aided by the internet has now come to stay, which has brought in cryptocurrency to support local and international financial transactions. This qualitative study used content analysis research techniques to assess the impact of cryptocurrency on traditional banking and fiat currency. The findings of this study were, firstly cryptocurrency has similar features and function of banks and fiat currency, as it operates through the internet. Secondly, cryptocurrency functions as a unit of account, medium of exchange, store of value and an intermediary on fund accumulation and distribution. Thirdly, cryptocurrency which is dollarization 2.0 has come to restore the confidence and convenience of financial globalization in that it eliminates the third party from interfering with the transactional process. Lastly, its influence on central banks and governments is the elimination of seigniorage. What cryptocurrency requires now is the legal tender status through regulations.