Blockchain Papers

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Vincenzo P. Di Perna, Marco Bernardo, Francesco Fabris, Sebastião Amaro · 6 authors

Since blockchains are increasingly adopted in real-world applications, it is of paramount importance to evaluate their performance across diverse scenarios.Although the network infrastructure plays a fundamental role, its impact on performance remains largely unexplored.Some studies evaluate blockchain in cloud environments, but this approach is costly and difficult to reproduce.We propose a cost-effective and reproducible environment that supports both cluster-based setups and emulation capabilities and allows the underlying network topology to be easily modified.We evaluate five industry-grade blockchains -Algorand, Diem, Ethereum, Quorum, and Solana -across five network topologies -fat-tree, full mesh, hypercube, scale-free, and torus -and different realistic workloads -smart contract requests and transfer transactions.Our benchmark framework, Lilith, shows that full mesh, hypercube, and torus topologies improve blockchain performance under heavy workloads.Algorand and Diem perform consistently across the considered topologies, while Ethereum remains robust but slower.

Weihong Wang, Tom Van Cutsem

In blockchain networks, so-called "full nodes" serve data to and relay transactions from clients through an RPC interface. This serving layer enables integration of "Web3" data, stored on blockchains, with "Web2" mobile or web applications that cannot directly participate as peers in a blockchain network. In practice, the serving layer is dominated by a small number of centralized services ("node providers") that offer permissioned access to RPC endpoints. Clients register with these providers because they offer reliable and convenient access to blockchain data: operating a full node themselves requires significant computational and storage resources, and public (permissionless) RPC nodes lack financial incentives to serve large numbers of clients with consistent performance. Permissioned access to an otherwise permissionless blockchain network raises concerns regarding the privacy, integrity, and availability of data access. To address this, we propose a Permissionless Accountable RPC Protocol (PARP). It enables clients and full nodes to interact pseudonymously while keeping both parties accountable. PARP leverages "light client" schemes for essential data integrity checks, combined with fraud proofs, to keep full nodes honest and accountable. It integrates payment channels to facilitate micro-payments, holding clients accountable for the resources they consume and providing an economic incentive for full nodes to serve. Our prototype implementation for Ethereum demonstrates the feasibility of PARP, and we quantify its overhead compared to the base RPC protocol.

Jiali Zheng, Lijun Deng

No abstract is available for this record.

Bokolo Anthony

Energy prosumer communities offer a mechanism where prosumers can share, and trade locally produced renewable generation directly with consumers within the same energy community. Accordingly, there is need for a decentralized approaches that enables prosumers to locally balance generation and consumption. The deployment of emerging technologies such as Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), Internet of Things (IoT), and Artificial Intelligence (AI) can accelerate the integration of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) and advance the development of energy internet. Therefore, this article develops an energy system architecture that shows how DLT, IoT, and AI can be deployed to support the design and actualization of energy internet in Distributed Prosumer Energy Communities (DPEC). The system architecture support energy sharing and trading from energy prosumers to consumer. Findings from this study presents how DLT based smart contracts can be employed to securely manage energy transactions within the energy internet. The system architecture provides energy consumers and prosumers with a decentralized approach for sharing and trading local energy generation without requiring any central intermediary. More importantly, this study presents a use case on the applicability of DLT and AI to support micro grid operations in DPEC.

Bokolo Anthony Jnr

The use of Electric Vehicles (EV) will promote urban sustainability, decrease air pollution, and reduce noise pollution. In this landscape a new mobility concept termed shared electric mobility-as-a-service (eMaaS) has emerged over the years. Shared eMaaS comprises the seamless integration of various forms of electric transport services available via one single digital platform. Although, the current shared eMaaS solutions are based mostly on fragmented and siloed systems which has resulted to issues related to the exchange of data and services from different eMaaS providers. Therefore, there is need for integrators and enablers to achieve an inter-operable and intra-operable seamless shared eMaaS. To this end, Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT) is proposed in this study to enable new business models for shared electric mobility solutions. As compared to conventional approaches DLT offers a transparent, cost-efficient, and decentralized services both for managing the supply and demand sides of shared eMaaS to improve public transportation. Accordingly, this article presents a DLT based business models grounded on the literature to decentralize shared eMaaS. Qualitative data is collected from Scopus and Web of Science database, and descriptive analysis is employed to analyze the collected data. Findings from this study presents use case scenarios of how IOTA tangle as a DLT using smart contracts and IOTA wallet/tokens are deployed to design novel business models for managing seamless travel experience for electric car sharing and leasing to improve public transportation.

Mihajlo Karadžić, Dušan Mačkić, Sandra Rakočević, Marija Antić

Traditional STB management systems rely on TR-069, which faces challenges in scalability, security, and efficiency when dealing with modern IoT-based deployments. We compare WISE with TR-069 in terms of latency, scalability, and security, incorporating Zero-Knowledge Proof (ZKP) authentication to strengthen access control. Our evaluation demonstrates that WISE significantly reduces management latency and scales more efficiently compared to TR-069 while ensuring a more secure authentication process.

Saiyidai Wufuer, Yasen Aizezi, Zhu Weiwei, Rezhayiding Yasen

Cross-chain data sharing in decentralized storage networks faces challenges in security and performance, including data breaches and high latency. This paper proposes a layered protocol integrating decentralized storage and cross-chain communication to address these issues. The protocol ensures robust security and optimizes performance through sharding, encryption, and concurrency. Experimental results show significant improvements in throughput and latency compared to baseline schemes, with manageable storage overhead. This study offers a secure, efficient solution for cross-chain data sharing, with applications in decentralized finance and distributed computing. Future work will focus on high-load optimization and real-world validation.

Jefferson Celeiro Sousa, Bruno Evaristo, Antonio Mateus de Sousa, Ismael Ávila

Este artigo apresenta uma avaliação de performance de contratos inteligentes voltados à gestão de identidades digitais descentralizadas em redes blockchain baseadas em Ethereum. A análise foca em operações fundamentais do ciclo de vida de identidades, como criação, atualização, definição de esquemas de credenciais e controle de revogação, implementadas em contratos Solidity. Foram considerados dois contextos de execução: um ambiente com Hyperledger Besu operando em modo permissionado, e uma referência ao modelo tradicional Hyperledger Indy. Os testes foram conduzidos em rede privada simulando diferentes níveis de carga e configurações de consenso. As métricas avaliadas incluem tempo de resposta, vazão, uso de recursos (CPU e memória) e escalabilidade. Os resultados fornecem subsídios para a escolha de arquiteturas eficientes para soluções de identidade digital baseadas em SSI (Self-Sovereign Identity) e Ethereum, especialmente em cenários corporativos ou regulados.

Sana Naz, Scott Uk-Jin Lee

Blockchain technology uses a consensus mechanism to create and finalize blocks. The consensus mechanism affects the total performance parameters of the blockchain network, such as throughput. In this paper, we present “Nazfast”, a simplified proof of stake—Byzantine fault tolerance based consensus mechanism to create and finalize blocks. The presented consensus is completed in multiple folds. For block producer and validation committee selection, we used a secure and speeded-up election mechanism, S&Sem, in Nazfast. The consensus is designed for fast block finalization in a malicious environment. The simulation result shows that we approximately achieved three block finalizations in 1 s with almost similar latency. We reduced and fixed the number of validators in the consensus to improve the throughput. We achieved a higher throughput among other consensus of the same family. Because we reduced the number of validators, the safety parameters of the consensus are at risk, so we used Sea Shield to improve the overall consensus safety. This is another blockchain to save nodes’ details when they join/unjoin the network as validators. By using all three parts together, our system is protected from 28-plus different attacks, and we maintain a high decentralization by using S&Sem. Finally, we also enhance the incentive mechanism of consensus to improve the liveness of the network.

Zequn Xie, Wenlong Tian, Jianfeng Lu, Weijun Xiao · 5 authors

Detecting similar data is crucial for optimizing file storage and transmission in HTTP protocols and Content Delivery Networks.Traditional MinHash methods encounter significant efficiency challenges due to their reliance on K-shingle structures, resulting in high computational costs and storage requirements.Additionally, these methods expose privacy risks in cloud environments, where sensitive information can be inferred from MinHash signatures.To address both efficiency and security concerns, we propose Horse-MinHash, which integrates a fast, content-defined feature extraction scheme with a non-interactive zero-knowledge proof-based similarity estimation method.Our approach significantly enhances computational efficiency while ensuring robust privacy protection by preventing plaintext exposure.Experimental results demonstrate that Horse-MinHash achieves lower mean squared error in Jaccard similarity estimation and reduces time overhead for average block sizes of 16KB or more, outperforming state-of-the-art methods. CCS Concepts Security and privacy File system security; Management and querying of encrypted data.

Bo Yin, Yihu Liu, Binyao Xu

No abstract is available for this record.

Youlin Cheng, Dongmei Song, Xiang Lu

The investigation of Bitcoin network topology has garnered significant academic attention due to its potential to enhance blockchain system performance and strengthen network robustness. However, current Bitcoin P2P network topology reconstruction mechanisms face four critical limitations: inefficient topology recovery, reliance on obsolete protocols, poor compatibility with new protocol versions, and disruptive impacts on network operations. To address these challenges, we initiate our study from Bitcoin's network formation mechanisms. Through longitudinal analysis of client version control histories, we systematically trace the architectural evolution of its P2P network and perform the first protocol-level reverse engineering with the node discovery mechanism. Building on these insights, we propose a novel graph-theoretic analytical framework that introduces fresh perspectives for blockchain topology analysis. Our experimental validation on the live Bitcoin network identified 8,106 active nodes with 1.8 million connection edges, demonstrating a 38% improvement in node discovery efficiency over existing approaches. Comparative analysis further quantified the operational intrusiveness of mainstream connection restoration methods, confirming our method's capability to achieve complete topology reconstruction under non-intrusive conditions. These findings substantially expand the research horizons for blockchain network analysis by establishing an extended foundational network scope and delivering comprehensive topological datasets, providing critical infrastructure insights for future blockchain architecture research.

Hongzhou Chen, Chenyu Zhou, Abdulmotaleb El Saddik, Wei Cai

In the rapidly evolving Web3 world, non-fungible token (NFT) communities are reshaping the formation, distribution, and activation of social capital in ways distinct from traditional models. However, despite their growing impact on societal prosperity, a comprehensive understanding of social capital dynamics within Web3 NFT communities remains limited. This study explores the Mfers community, a key example within Web3 NFT ecosystems. By analyzing social media and blockchain data and using a Delphi method-based human-large language model (LLM) collaboration, we uncovered unique social capital patterns across six dimensions. Our findings highlight a compelling blend of decentralization, inclusion, trust, and empowerment but also raise critical questions about wealth inequality, content quality, and ethical challenges. Based on the findings, we discussed the uniqueness of social capital in Web3 NFT communities, the tension between technical and power decentralization, and the multidimensional nature of societal prosperity. We also suggested directions for future research on decentralized online communities in the CSCW field. This study provides a systematic perspective on social capital in Web3 NFT communities and introduces an innovative human-LLM collaborative analysis, offering insights into the design and governance of benign decentralized online communities.

Daniel Hindemburg de Miranda Marques, Dalton Cézane Gomes Valadares

5G is the most recent technology standard for cellular networks, and one of its key elements is the Radio Access Networks (RAN), which furthers the enabling of the 5G basic capabilities: enhanced Mobile Broadband (eMBB), Massive Machine-Type Communication (mMTC), and Ultra-Reliable, Low-Latency Communication (URLLC). To meet the capabilities required by 5G use cases, 5G is distributed, virtualized, and architecturally more complex than previous generations. These capabilities bring benefits but introduce risks and security challenges that must be addressed through controls designed to support and secure 5G services across any operator cloud. Therefore, this paper focuses on studying and evaluating security mechanisms used in RANs. Special attention is given to Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs) since they are one of the most studied topics regarding security enhancement. DLTs could bring advantages for improving network security through encryption to protect the information and automate verification and execution of transactions. For this reason, we carried out a systematic review, extracting and analyzing data from 39 papers from 2010 to 2023. Our main results list RAN-related susceptible security dimensions, vulnerabilities, and possible attacks and threats. We also show how DLTs can enhance RANs and present other considered mechanisms to increase RAN security. • The evolution of mobile communication based on openness, softwarization, and virtualization inserts new vulnerabilities into networks. • The increasing number of connected devices, especially IoT ones, is a security attention point in mobile networks. • Various security mechanisms, including Distributed ledger technologies (DLT), may enhance RAN security once these technologies can increase system resilience. • Other security approaches may also address RAN security issues.

Mingxuan Song, Pengze Li, Bohan Zhou, Shenglin Yin · 6 authors

Sharding blockchain networks face significant scalability challenges due to high frequencies of cross-shard transactions and uneven workload distributions among shards. To address these scalability issues, account migration offers a promising solution. However, existing migration solutions struggle with the high computational overhead and insufficient capture of complex transaction patterns. We propose AERO, a deep reinforcement learning framework to facilitate efficient account migration in sharding blockchains. AERO employs a prefix-based grouping strategy to enable group-level migration decisions and capture complex transaction patterns and relationships between accounts. We also implement a sharding blockchain system called AEROChain, which integrates AERO and aligns with the blockchain decentralization principle. Extensive evaluation with real Ethereum transaction data demonstrates that AERO improves the system throughput by 31.77% compared to existing solutions, effectively reducing cross-shard transactions and balancing shard workloads.

Peker Celik, Emre Sefer

Abstract Decentralized and transparent nature of cryptocurrencies have lately increased investors interest in them. Forecasting cryptocurrency’s price accurately is crucial to come up with a good investment strategy, and such a forecast requires one to consider its unique attributes as well as high volatility. Even though many existing studies have focused on analyzing the cryptocurrency transaction graph topology, studies on the analysis of transaction graph’s impact on prices are quite limited. In this paper, we explore the forecasting ability of blockchain transaction graph-based attributes on Bitcoin’s and Ethereum’s future price via deep learning methods. More specifically, we came up with motif convolution module (MCM), a motif-based graph representation learning approach to take local structural knowledge into account more strongly in node and edge-attributed transaction graphs encoding substantial structural knowledge. Our proposed MCM constructs a motif dictionary without supervision, and employs a new motif convolution operation while extracting the vertices local structural context. Afterwards, we learn high-level vertex embeddings by using such structural context via multilayer perceptron and graph neural network. Overall, we extract the attributed transaction graphs temporally-evolving low-dimensional representations, and use such embedding data together with historical prices within self-attention-based LSTM to predict the future prices accurately. Our proposed approach outperforms all considered baselines in terms of both price and price direction prediction, showing the promise of efficient integration of transaction data into cryptocurrency price prediction.

Wenqing Li, Zhenguang Liu, Zhenguang Liu, Jianhai Chen · 7 authors

The rapid expansion of decentralized finance (DeFi) applications has catalyzed the emergence of new blockchain systems at an unprecedented pace. However, these systems are largely evolving in isolation, hindering the development of a cohesive ecosystem where value and data can flow seamlessly across networks. Blockchain interoperability technologies are introduced to break down these communication barriers and facilitate effective interactions between different blockchain systems. In recent years, numerous approaches and solutions to blockchain interoperability have been proposed. While some reviews have attempted to categorize cross-chain solutions based on blockchain standards and architectures, a more in-depth analysis is warranted. In this work, we investigate mainstream cross-chain solutions from the perspective of their principles, applications, protocols, and performance. To clarify the concept of blockchain interoperability, we propose a conceptual model that characterizes both asset interoperability and data interoperability. Furthermore, we introduce a hierarchical architecture to categorize and analyze representative cross-chain solutions, covering both academic research and industrial implementations. To maximize the utility of this review for a wide audience, we also highlight open challenges and identify future directions in the field of blockchain interoperability, expecting to provide a comprehensive overview of cross-chain solutions.

Echezona Uzoma, Joy Onma Enyejo, Toyosi Motilola Olola

The integration of distributed ledger technologies (DLTs) into multi-cloud environments presents a transformative approach to addressing data integrity and transactional security challenges in modern digital infrastructures. This review comprehensively examines the intersection of multi-cloud computing and distributed ledger systems, highlighting their potential to provide decentralized, tamper-proof, and transparent data management solutions across diverse cloud platforms. The paper explores key architectural frameworks, consensus mechanisms, interoperability protocols, and cryptographic models that enable seamless integration while ensuring scalability, reliability, and enhanced security. Furthermore, it analyzes current use cases, such as supply chain management, financial services, and healthcare, where multi-cloud DLT integration mitigates risks of single points of failure, data breaches, and unauthorized access. By identifying emerging trends, technological limitations, and research gaps, this review offers valuable insights into optimizing multi- cloud DLT deployments for robust data integrity and secure transactional processes. The study underscores the growing importance of cross-cloud blockchain interoperability and regulatory compliance in advancing secure and resilient multi- cloud ecosystems.

Manpreet Kaur, Shikha Gupta

The consensus protocol is essential in practically every blockchain application. Most of these existing blockchain consensus protocols need massive computationalcapabilities, substantial energy consumption, and dependency on monetary stakes. These shortcomings in the mainstream consensus approach lead to their unsuitability for low-resource applications like IoT. As a result of this work, a lightweight consensus process referred as Delegated Proof of Accessibility(DPoAC) is implemented and evaluated. DPoAC makes use of Shamir secret sharing, Proof of Stake (PoS) with random selection, and the Inter-PlanetaryFile System (IPFS). The DPoAC operation is composed of four modules: secret generation and distribution, retrieval of secret shares, block creation andverification, and block rewards and penalty. A detailed description of DPoAC has been provided and implemented in JavaScript and experimental resultsdemonstrate that our solution meets the necessary performance and security requirements for a lightweight scalable protocol for IoT systems.

Mingxing He, Qiang Wei, Jun Xiong

In order to solve the problem of low security of high network information sharing, the architecture and implementation of agent-based information sharing and pushing system are proposed. Firstly, the information node registration algorithm is introduced to draw the organization network connected to the public network into an orderly block network and extract the abnormal information of network nodes; Secondly, a complete network identity security threat intelligence is generated through effective scheduling and transmission of network identity security threat intelligence; Finally, the distributed ledger technology is introduced to match it with IP network, and the private chain and data are extracted by constructing data structure on the information chain to realize the generation and operation of intelligence information sharing model. The experimental results show that the model designed in this paper can protect the privacy information that all network users need to protect in the process of sharing information resources, and its privacy protection intensity exceeds 0.950. Conclusion: The proposed sharing model can realize the safe sharing of user intelligence information in practical application, and the user’s private intelligence information will not be leaked during the sharing process, which reduces the threat degree of network security.

Hirenkumar Patel

This article explores how blockchain technology fundamentally transforms identity management in payment ecosystems through decentralized identity frameworks. The paper examines how distributed ledger technology addresses traditional challenges including security vulnerabilities, inefficient KYC processes, and privacy concerns. Self-Sovereign Identity principles empower users with control over their personal data through digital wallets and verifiable credentials that enable selective disclosure. The implementation architecture integrates identity registration, digital wallet infrastructure, verification protocols, smart contract governance, and secure transaction finalization. This approach creates significant benefits across the payment ecosystem – financial institutions experience reduced fraud and streamlined compliance, merchants benefit from higher conversion rates and reduced liability, while consumers gain enhanced privacy and security. Despite these advantages, the paper acknowledges challenges including standardization requirements, regulatory alignment, credential recovery mechanisms, and scalability considerations that must be addressed for widespread adoption of decentralized identity in payment systems.

Hina Binte Haq, Syed Taha Ali, A. G. Sal'Man, Patrick McCorry · 5 authors

The Bitcoin mempool plays an integral role in transaction processing and propagation through the network. Frequent transaction congestion events, as well as spam and dust attacks can clog the mempool, leading to dropped transactions, processing delays, and increased transaction fees. Moreover, increasing transaction loads on the network result in higher resource costs to operate full nodes, thereby restricting Bitcoin's network footprint and negatively impacting its overall health and performance. In this paper, we present Carbyne, a novel mempool optimization scheme, which uses counting bloom filter constructions to adapt to increased transaction flows, thereby making nodes resilient to congestion and spam and dust attacks. We implement Carbyne in C++ and benchmark its performance using a novel data set of Bitcoin mempool activity over a 90-day period. We dramatically reduced the mempool's memory consumption by up to two orders of magnitude (from 300 MB to 3 MB) while verifying and forwarding transactions with 99.9% fidelity and a slight increase in computational load. We simulate extensive spam attacks on Carbyne and demonstrate that mempool loads of 1 GB can be accommodated in as little as 10 MB. Carbyne does not necessitate a hard fork, it will help deploy high-functioning nodes on resource-constrained platforms, and it may also be adapted to other cryptocurrencies.

Joseph Oglio, Mikhail Nesterenko, Gokarna Sharma

We present SmartShards: a new sharding algorithm for improving Byzantine tolerance and churn resistance in blockchains. Our algorithm places a peer in multiple shards to create an overlap. This simplifies cross-shard communication and shard membership management. We describe SmartShards, prove it correct and evaluate its performance. We propose several SmartShards extensions: defense against a slowly adaptive adversary, combining transactions into blocks, fortification against the join/leave attack.