This is a data descriptor paper for a set of the battery output data measurements during the turned on display discharge process caused by the execution of modern mobile blockchain projects on Android devices. The measurements were executed for Proof-of-Work (PoW) and Proof-of-Activity (PoA) consensus algorithms. In this descriptor, we give examples of Samsung Galaxy S9 operation while a broader range of measurements is available in the dataset. Examples provide the data about battery output current, output voltage, temperature, and status. We also show the measurements obtained utilizing short-range (IEEE 802.11n) and cellular (LTE) networks. This paper describes the proposed dataset and the method employed to gather the data. To provide a further understanding of the dataset’s nature, an analysis of the collected data is also briefly presented. This dataset may be of interest to both researchers from information security and human–computer interaction fields and industrial distributed ledger/blockchain developers.
The interest in the blockchain technology has been increasing since its inception and it has been applied to many fields and sectors. The blockchain technology creates a decentralized environment where no third party controls the data and transaction. Mobile apps recommendation has been extensively used to recommend apps to mobile users. For example, Android-based recommendation applications have been developed to recommend other mobile apps for download depending on user’s preferences and mobile context. These recommendations help users discover apps by referring to the experiences of other users. Due to the collection of a large amount of data and user information, there is a problem of insecurity and user’s privacy that are prone to be attacked. To address this issue the blockchain technology can be incorporated to assure cryptographic safety. In this paper, we present a survey of the on-going mobile app recommendations and e-commerce technology trend to address how the blockchain can be incorporated into the collaborative filtering recommendation systems to enable the users to set up a secured data, which implies the importance of user privacy preference on personalized app recommendations.
Indrasena R. Aenugu, Gomanth Bere, Justin J. Ochoa, Taesic Kim · 6 authors
This paper proposes a blockchain-powered battery data management and analytics platform which fully utilizes blockchain technology for battery health monitoring in battery energy storage systems (e.g., electric vehicles) and accelerating battery cell development. The proposed platform consists of five distinct components: 1) blockchain clients using application SDK such as battery energy storage systems and a battery tester; 2) a multichannel blockchain network for enhanced data security, privacy, and management; 3) data preprocessing; 4) data analytics engine executing analytics tools and health monitoring algorithms; and 5) user-friendly service visualization. The proposed platform is implemented in an AWS cloud and tested using real-time battery data from a battery energy storage system (BESS) client and batch data from a battery cell tester client. The results show that each blockchain channels can independently manage and analyze data sources from two clients in a blockchain network. The proposed platform will enable a new level of data security and privacy preserved battery intelligence system used for both battery product development and lifetime battery health monitoring.
Gomanth Bere, Justin J. Ochoa, Taesic Kim, Indrasena R. Aenugu
Blockchain technology has many beneficial properties that can advance electric vehicles in cyber-physical environments, especially for security-related purposes for EV battery management systems (BMSs). This paper explores firmware security vulnerabilities of a current BMS through reverse engineering and how the blockchain technology can be applied toward a next-generation BMS by managing critical activities and tasks including BMS firmware security check, recovery, and patch generation. A breakthrough method for blockchain-based automated detection of the firmware vulnerabilities and a patch generation is implemented in Internet-of-Thing (IoT) security modules as nodes of a blockchain network and validated by experiments. The proposed methods transformative to other cyber-physical system applications.
An Internet of Things (IoT) network can have different components such as servers, gateways, and the end devices. An important source of performance constraint in such an IoT network is found in the limitations of its gateway. The capability of a gateway can dictate the effectiveness of a network and its services. The capacity, power consumption, and security of an IoT gateway are revealed as sources of network bottlenecks and service constraints. Blockchain technology can create a decentralized structure that can offload these strains. To unify these nodes as gateways under the same network, we need an effective means of communication. This paper proposes a setup that makes use of the decentralized capabilities of private blockchain technology partnered with the low-powered and secure connection of Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE). This provides a more secure means of wireless communication and prevents the nodes from being concentrated within an area. The architecture was compared against a standard WiFi network (2.4GHz) to prove its feasibility in effectively carrying out its functionality. In an experiment that used 4 gateway nodes, BLE proved to be more feasible than WiFi by yielding a better verification packet rate of 14 per minute compared to its counterpart that measured 4 per minute. Also, it showed to be more efficient in terms of power consumption with an average of 1095.40 mW, while the WiFi setup was measured to be 1191.83 mW. These results show promise in using BLE paired with blockchain technology to solve the capacity, power and security issues in IoT networks.
Electric Vehicles (EVs) have generated a lot of interest in recent years, due to the advances in battery life and low pollution. Similarly, the expansion of the Internet of Things (IoT) allowed more and more devices to be interconnected. One major problem EVs face today is the limited range of the battery and the limited number of charging or battery swapping stations. A solution is to not only build the necessary infrastructure, but also to be able to correctly estimate the remaining power using an efficient battery management system (BMS). For some EVs, battery swapping can also be an option, either at registered stations, or even directly from other EV drivers. Thus, a network of EV information is required, so that a successful battery charge or swap can be made available for drivers. In this paper two blockchain implementations for an EV BMS are presented, using blockchain as the network and data layer of the application. The first implementation uses Ethereum as the blockchain framework for developing smart contracts, while the second uses a directed acyclic graph (DAG), on top of the IOTA tangle. The two approaches are implemented and compared, demonstrating that both platforms can provide a viable solution for an efficient, semi-decentralized, data-driven BMS.
Distributed renewable energy offers an exciting opportunity for sustainable transition and climate change mitigation. However, it is overlooked in most of the conventional tradable green certificates programs. Blockchain shows an advantage of incorporating a galaxy of distributed prosumers in a transparent and low-cost manner. This paper proposes I-Green, a blockchain-based individual green certificates system for promoting voluntary adoption of distributed renewable energy. Combing the features of blockchain technology and the theories of social norm and peer effects, the novel green ratio incentive scheme and proof of generation consensus protocol are designed for I-Green. A blockchain simulator is constructed to evaluate the effectiveness and efficiency of I-Green system. The simulation results present its potential for facilitating widespread adoption of distributed generation, and confirm the feasibility of blockchain as the information communication technology (ICT).
Electric Vehicles (EVs) have generated a lot of interest in recent years, due to the advances in battery life and low pollution. Similarly, the expansion of Internet of Things (IoT) allowed more devices to be interconnected. One major problem electric vehicles face today is the limited range of the battery and the limited number of charging or battery swapping stations. A solution is to not only build the necessary infrastructure, but also to be able to correctly estimate the remaining power, using an efficient battery management system (BMS). For some EVs, battery swapping can also be an option, either at registered stations, or even directly from other EV drivers. Thus, a network of EV information is required, so that a successful battery charge or swap can be made available for drivers. In this paper, a blockchain implementation for an EV BMS is presented, using the IOTA tangle as the network and data layer of the application.
Blockchain-enabled Federated Learning (BFL) enables mobile devices to\ncollaboratively train neural network models required by a Machine Learning\nModel Owner (MLMO) while keeping data on the mobile devices. Then, the model\nupdates are stored in the blockchain in a decentralized and reliable manner.\nHowever, the issue of BFL is that the mobile devices have energy and CPU\nconstraints that may reduce the system lifetime and training efficiency. The\nother issue is that the training latency may increase due to the blockchain\nmining process. To address these issues, the MLMO needs to (i) decide how much\ndata and energy that the mobile devices use for the training and (ii) determine\nthe block generation rate to minimize the system latency, energy consumption,\nand incentive cost while achieving the target accuracy for the model. Under the\nuncertainty of the BFL environment, it is challenging for the MLMO to determine\nthe optimal decisions. We propose to use the Deep Reinforcement Learning (DRL)\nto derive the optimal decisions for the MLMO.\n
This thesis investigates blockchain technology and whether its mutually cooperative topology and commons-based peer production practices have implications for society because, instead of the traditional top-down, centralised model of governance, blockchains represent an alternative way of collaborating. Much of the literature anticipates the vast potential of the permanent and publicly auditable nature of the propagated values of blockchains. Indeed, writers have supposed that the smart contract capabilities of the technology may prove revolutionary for areas beyond that of the economic domain targeted by the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, which is the first successful use-case of a blockchain. However, few advanced use cases beyond that economic realm have materialised; this research demonstrates such usecases. This thesis asks four research questions. The first asks whether blockchains can help reduce energy consumption. The second asks whether blockchains can help digitise the informal sector. The third asks whether blockchains can help counter fake news. The final question asks whether blockchains can help address criticisms of humanitarian aid. Those topics are four amongst many urgent problems currently facing humankind, and therefore, the overarching research question of this thesis becomes whether blockchains can help humanity. This work advances the supposed potential of blockchains proposed by current literature by using design science research to create software artefacts that propose solutions for incentivising energy efficiency, fighting financial fraud, providing digital provenance and adding trust to humanitarian aid reporting. By demonstrating blockchain-based software solutions in those four topic areas, this thesis concludes that blockchains can help humanity. However, if they are to help society address some of its problems, blockchains have significant technological and organisational barriers to overcome. Furthermore, the idea that blockchains can help humanity is a form of techno-determinism and this research concludes that it is impossible to solve every issue by diversifying technical operations; humankind must also change political, economic, and cultural goals, too. Nevertheless, this thesis has implications for regulators, despite the barriers and false solutionism offered by technology because, rather than the trusted lawmakers and experts that nations used to look up to as oracles of truth, now it may be possible to look to blockchains, instead.
In recent decades, the dramatic increase in global industrial activity has resulted in a significant rise in the use of fossil fuel energy resources, while technological progress has increased the carbon footprint and hence global warming. The significant increase in energy consumption caused by the Internet of Things (IoT) technology has created a new challenge and diverted our focus toward creating a more eco-friendly IoT ecosystem. The green IoT is an emerging field that has attracted a great deal of attention from researchers and industries, as it provides energy efficient services and enables the production and use of renewable energy. Meanwhile, blockchain technology has become a highly adoptable technology in the IoT and is attracting considerable interest from energy supply companies, business start-ups, financial institutions, governments and researchers. This study focuses on the role of the emerging blockchain technology in the green IoT ecosystem, presents the crucial factors that need to be taken into consideration in order to build a green IoT ecosystem, and discusses how blockchain technology contributes to make the IoT ecosystem greener. It also presents the open issues and future research directions to be considered when creating a sustainable green IoT ecosystem using blockchain technology.
This paper examines the benefits and constraints of applying blockchain technology for the Paris Agreement carbon market mechanism and develops a list of technical requirements and soft factors as selection criteria to test the feasibility of two different blockchain platforms. The carbon market mechanism, as outlined in Article 6.2 of the Paris Agreement, can accelerate climate action by enabling cooperation between national Parties. However, in the past, carbon markets were limited by several constraints. Our research investigates these constraints and translates them into selection criteria to design a blockchain platform to overcome these past limitations. The developed selection criteria and assumptions developed in this paper provide an orientation for blockchain assessments. Using the selection criteria, we examine the feasibility of two distinct blockchains, Ethereum and Hyperledger Fabric, for the specific use case of Article 6.2. These two blockchain systems represent contrary forms of design and governance; Ethereum constitutes a public and permissionless blockchain governance system, while Hyperledger Fabric represents a private and permissioned governance system. Our results show that both blockchain systems can address present carbon market constraints by enhancing market transparency, increasing process automation, and preventing double counting. The final selection and blockchain system implementation will first be possible, when the Article 6 negotiations are concluded, and governance preferences of national Parties are established. Our paper informs about the viability of different blockchain systems, offers insights into governance options, and provides a valuable framework for a concrete blockchain selection in the future.
Taesic Kim, Justin J. Ochoa, Tasnimun Faika, H. Alan Mantooth · 7 authors
Lithium-ion (Li-ion) batteries are a key energy storage component in various electrical and electronic systems, such as mobile phones and electric vehicles. A properly designed battery management system (BMS) is crucial to guarantee the safety, reliability, and optimal performance of the battery, as well as to interconnect the battery systems with each other and external systems through communication channels. However, security threats of the Li-ion battery systems are often overlooked by BMS developers in the design phase. The cybersecurity of BMSs is an essential factor to consider as more battery systems require internet connectivity for functionality, such as intelligent monitoring, control, and maintenance. This article discusses the overall security vulnerabilities from potential cyber-attacks and defense strategies, as well as the adoption of current blockchain technology in BMSs, which will be used as a cybersecurity baseline reference to BMS developers. The implementation of blockchain technology is promising to protect BMSs from malicious cyber-physical attacks and ensure the secure utilization of battery systems for numerous applications in cyber-physical environments.
Nils Siegfried, Tobias Rosenthal, Alexander Benlian
Purpose The purpose of this paper is to investigate the suitability of Blockchain technology for applications in the Industrial Internet of Things (IIOT). It provides a taxonomy of system requirements for such applications and maps these requirements against the Blockchain’s technological idiosyncrasies. Design/methodology/approach A requirement taxonomy is built in an iterative process based on a descriptive literature review. In total, 223 studies have been screened leading to a relevant sample of 48 publications that were analyzed in detail regarding posed system requirements. Subsequently, Blockchain’s capabilities are discussed for each requirement dimension. Findings The paper presents a taxonomy of six requirement dimensions. In the mapping process, areas of greater fit (e.g., reliability, nonrepudiation and adaptability) were identified. However, there are also several constraints (e.g., scalability, confidentiality and performance) that limit the use of Blockchain. Research limitations/implications Due to the limited amount of studies and the vibrant development of Blockchain technology, the results may benefit from practical evidence. Researchers are encouraged to validate the results in qualitative practitioner interviews. Focusing on literature-backed public Blockchain, idiosyncrasies of private implementations and specific distributed ledger technologies may be discussed in future studies. Practical implications The paper includes use cases for Blockchain in manufacturing and IIOT applications. Potential caveats for practitioners are presented. Originality/value This paper addresses the need to understand to which degree Blockchain is a suitable technology in manufacturing, especially in context of the IIOT. It contributes a requirement taxonomy which serves as the foundation for a systematic fit assessment.
Emerging technologies have played an important role in driving major changes in human society. However, the advent of most technologies is typically initially accompanied by confusion; this is often because technology developers overlook the user perspective. This study was conducted to systematically determine the fundamental causes of problems that users encounter when they interact with blockchain technology, one of the promising emerging technologies today, and to suggest relevant design strategies. To this end, usability evaluation was conducted for the KDEX decentralized exchange application. To ensure the effective identification of the significant usability problems, heuristic evaluation with four experts and usability testing with 23 experimental participants were carried out. The results obtained show that more user-centered design is necessary to enable the widespread use of decentralized applications. Based on the experimental findings, actionable design strategies that facilitate the effective utilization of emerging technologies are suggested. The proposed strategies are expected to enable users to easily understand and navigate applications based on these technologies.
Muhammad T. Afzal, Qi Huang, Waqas Amin, Khalid Umer · 6 authors
Existing work in energy demand side management focuses on the interaction between the utility grid and consumers. However, the previous technique is not focused on energy trading in local community of a renewable energy generation, distributed demand side management and not suitable for real-time environment. This paper presents a distributed demand side management system among multiple homes in community microgrid, with the integration of the internet of things smart meter and in the presence of renewable energy sources. The proposed energy consumption game is formulated for minimizing the cost of electricity in the individual home and the total cost of energy consumption in the whole community. The smart home users are playing game by optimizing their own daily energy consumption of appliances. The multiple participants include the self renewable generation of users, shared community microgrid and optional utility company. Each participant applies its best strategy to minimize energy consumption cost and users can maintain their own privacy of energy consumption. Moreover, the proposed scheme is distributed on blockchain, which provides a trusted communication medium between the participants. It enforces the autonomous monitoring of smart appliances and the billing of electricity consumption via smart contracts. Solidity smart contract is deployed to facilitate the execution of transactions without the involvement of third party in the smart community. Comparison of the results show that the proposed approach minimizes the total cost of energy consumption as well as each user's energy consumption cost.
Blockchain, a distributed and democratically-sustained public register of the transactions of the digital currency "Bitcoin", proposed by Satoshi Nakamoto a pseudonym of a hided developer in 2009, has been the driver of a huge number of initiatives devoted to develop and implement a peer-to-peer distributed database, and with no central authority created as an open source software. Expansion of Bitcoin, as well as other digital currencies, has been due to lower transaction costs, high security protocols and lack of inflation with respect to fiat money and no need of a clearing entity or a central bank. Although, environmental issues related to the use of this currency and, in particular, in the energy consumes, have been raised by the scientific community, but no signals of limiting factors have been detected until now. The hidden in the wings blockchain technology has been recognized the driver of innovation in various fields, contributing to create a more sustainable world. The purpose of this paper is to describe both the recent trends in the applications of the blockchain technology in the cryptocurrencies market and the new projects considering the environmental sustainability (energy consumption, materials depletion) and social impacts. The contribute of blockchain in reducing and accelerating bureaucracy and incentivizing environmentally friendly behaviour, has been discussed. Although the environmental issues related to the energy consumed in Bitcoin mining may scare companies in adopting the new technology, there is no evidence of limiting factors or carrying capacity of the entire system. In future the development of a less energy intensive alternative for validating the blocks to stack in the distributed database, would render the blockchain the ideal candidate for the applicability of sustainability paradigms in the economic, environmental and social sectors.
Abstract Blockchain and blockchain‐based decentralised applications have been attracting increasing attention recently. In public blockchain systems, users usually connect to third‐party peers or run a peer to join the P2P blockchain network. However, connecting to unreliable blockchain peers will lead to resource waste and even loss of cryptocurrencies by repeated transactions. In order to select reliable blockchain peers, it is urgently needed to evaluate and predict their reliability of them. Faced with this problem, we propose hybrid blockchain reliability prediction (H‐BRP), a Hybrid Blockchain Reliability Prediction model, to extract the blockchain reliability factors and then make the personalised prediction for each user. Comprehensive experiments conducted on 100 blockchain requesters and 200 blockchain peers demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed H‐BRP model. Further, the implementation and dataset of 2,000,000 test cases are released.
Jose P. Martins, João C. Ferreira, Vítor Monteiro, José A. Afonso · 5 authors
In this research work, we apply the Internet of Things (IoT) paradigm with a decentralized blockchain approach to handle the electric vehicle (EV) charging process in shared spaces, such as condominiums. A mobile app handles the user authentication mechanism to initiate the EV charging process, where a set of sensors are used for measuring energy consumption, and based on a microcontroller, establish data communication with the mobile app. A blockchain handles financial transitions, and this approach can be replicated to other EV charging scenarios, such as public charging systems in a city, where the mobile device provides an authentication mechanism. A user interface was developed to visualize transactions, gather users’ preferences, and handle power charging limitations due to the usage of a shared infrastructure. The developed approach was tested in a shared space with three EVs using a charging infrastructure for a period of 3.5 months.
Chi-Kin Chau, Jiajia Xu, Wilson G. Bow, Khaled Elbassioni
P2P (peer-to-peer) energy sharing allows household users to share their local energy resources (e.g., rooftop PVs, home batteries) based on an agreed cost-sharing mechanism (e.g., implemented as a smart contract over a blockchain ledger). Sharing energy resources is becoming a new form of sharing economy. This not only promotes renewable energy adoption among household users but also optimizes their energy resources efficiently. However, household users are self-interested and incentive-driven. It is not clear how to motivate them to team up for energy sharing, and what proper economic mechanisms are to incentivize them to do so in a socially efficient way. This paper sheds light on the economic principles of cost-sharing mechanisms for P2P energy sharing. We investigate P2P energy sharing scenarios of direct connections and grid settlement with simple cost-sharing mechanisms (e.g., proportional-split, bargaining games), and the subsequent stable coalitions, such that no group of users will deviate to form other coalitions. We characterize the social efficiency of P2P energy sharing by the strong price of anarchy that compares the worst-case stable coalitions and a social optimum. We show that the strong price of anarchy is mild, both in practice (by an extensive data analysis on a real-world P2P energy sharing project) and in theory (by a small bound in general settings). This can hence bolster the viability of P2P energy sharing.
A large portion of the software side of our information technology infrastructure, including web search, email, social media, transportation information, and much more, is provided "free" to the end users, although the corporations that provide this are often enormously profitable. The business model involves customized advertising and behavior manipulation, powered by intensive gathering and cross-correlation of personal information. Significant other parts of our IT infrastructure use fees-for-service but still involve intensive information gathering and behavior manipulation. There are significant indirect costs of these business models, including loss of privacy, supporting surveillance by both corporations and the state, automated manipulations of behavior, undermining the democratic process, and consumerism with its attendant environmental costs. In a recent book, Shoshana Zuboff terms this "surveillance capitalism." Our primary focus in this essay is how we could develop new models for providing these services. We describe some intermediate steps toward those models: education, regulation, and resistance. Following that, we discuss a partial solution, involving for-profit corporations that provide these services without tracking personal information. Finally, we describe desired characteristics for more comprehensive solutions, and outline a range of such solutions for different portions of the IT infrastructure that more truly return control to the end users. A common feature of several is the use of highly decentralized storage of information (either on the end user's own personal devices or on small servers), a modular architecture and interface to allow for customization of what information is to be shared, and a distributed ledger mechanism for authentication.