Blockchain Papers

Dharmendra Kumar, D. V. Chandini, B. Dinesh Reddy, Debnath Bhattacharyya · 5 authors

The Secure Electronic Voting System using Blockchain Technology is ensured to make the current voting process to take place in an honest, accurate and highly secure way. This system stores the details of the voters and votes in two separate blockchains, which provides transparency into election results by allowing voters to independently audit the ballot box while protecting each voter's right to privacy. All the details of the voters get stored into one Blockchain, and this guarantees greater security by providing a PIN confirmed before the vote is taken into consideration. By casting votes as transactions, we can create another blockchain which keeps track of the tallies of the votes. This way, everyone can count the votes themselves, they can verify that no votes were changed or removed, and no illegitimate votes were added and as a result, is made public everyone can agree upon the final count. This system is only taking the current process of voting in an election and bringing that process entirely online, in an attempt to make it highly secure and also more accessible by allowing the voter to vote at his/her location and also reducing the effort put by staff members.

Ruben Recabarren, Bogdan Cărbunar

Abstract Providing reliable and surreptitious communications is difficult in the presence of adaptive and resourceful state level censors. In this paper we introduce Tithonus, a framework that builds on the Bitcoin blockchain and network to provide censorship-resistant communication mechanisms. In contrast to previous approaches, we do not rely solely on the slow and expensive blockchain consensus mechanism but instead fully exploit Bitcoin’s peer-to-peer gossip protocol. We develop adaptive, fast and cost effective data communication solutions that camouflage client requests into inconspicuous Bitcoin transactions. We propose solutions to securely request and transfer content, with unobservability and censorship resistance, and free, pay-per-access and subscription based payment options. When compared to state-of-the-art Bitcoin writing solutions, Tithonus reduces the cost of transferring data to censored clients by 2 orders of magnitude and increases the goodput by 3 to 5 orders of magnitude. We show that Tithonus client initiated transactions are hard to detect, while server initiated transactions cannot be censored without creating split world problems to the Bit-coin blockchain.

Zhaofeng Ma, Weihua Huang, Hongmin Gao

With the development of Internet technology, transmitting, editing and misusing the digital multimedia bring great challenges in misusing detection for multimedia content protection. In this paper we proposed an artwork image digital rights management scheme for Internet misusing detection based on watermark and blockchain with robustness and high-level security. We embed artwork right information such as author, RightHolder, Date and Location information into the artwork image data. In the scheme, we use image Arnold transform to enhance the security and use image DCT coefficients of middle frequency to embed watermark for robustness. In the transparence of watermark, HVS and Watson models are used to control the watermark strength, which can enhance the invisibility. Once the suspicious image data from Internet are misused and spreading the image data on Internet without authorization, especially the high value artwork image data, we can trace the misuse responsibility by extracting the watermark. And according to the above algorithm, we implemented the scheme as DRMChain based on the consortium blockchain which stored the artwork and DRM information in an un-tampered ledger for decentralized rights confirmation. Large amount of experiments indicate the proposed watermark-based trusted blockchain DRM scheme is secure, robust, and for the protection and misuse detection of image data.

Clement Chan Zheng Wei, Chuah Chai Wen

Current electronic voting protocol require a centralized system to control the whole procedure from ballot inputs to result outputs and election monitoring. Meanwhile, blockchain technology provide a decentralized system which open across the whole network of untrusted participants. Applying blockchain technology into electronic voting protocol through a proper architecture can instil characteristic such as data confidentiality, data integrity and data authenticity. In this paper, we going to discuss a proposed method on how to leverage the advantages from blockchain into electronic voting protocol. This blockchain-based electronic voting protocol promise to provide a secure electronic election process given the proposed system works. We implement a protocol using blockchain to turn election protocol into an automated control system without relying any single point of entity. Lastly, we discuss the characteristics of our proposed blockchain-based electronic voting protocol in this paper. However, there are also emerging challenges and limitations awaiting to overcome. This paper gives a comprehensive overview of our proposed protocol.

Somdip Dey

Blockchain's vast applications in different industries have drawn several researchers to pursue extensive research in securing blockchain technologies. In recent times we could see several institutions coming together to create consortium based blockchain networks such as Hyperledger. Although for applications of blockchain such as Bitcoin, Litcoin, etc. the majority-attack might not be a great threat but for consortium based blockchain networks where we could see several institutions such as public, private, government, etc. are collaborating, the majority-attack might just prove to be a prevalent threat if collusion among these institutions takes place. This paper proposes a methodology where we can use intelligent software agents to monitor the activity of stakeholders in the blockchain networks to detect anomaly such as collusion, using supervised machine learning algorithm and algorithmic game theory and stop the majority attack from taking place.

Zhenyu Guan, Ying Zhao, Dawei Li, Jianwei Liu

Big data technology has brought innovation and convenience to many areas, such as medical diagnosis, financial investment and smart travel. However, one of the most urgent challenges is how to collect massive private data from end customers effectively without invasion of privacy. In this paper, a framework, called Trusted Big Data Collection and Trade (TBDCT) system, is proposed to provide a fair and trusted platform for every participant in big data world. Firstly, by adopting technology of Physical Unclonable Function (PUF), data is binded with the 'fingerprint' of the sensor to identify the authenticity of source. Secondly, private network attached storage embedded with Trusted Security Module (TSM) is used to guarantee the trustability of collecting process. Lastly, blockchain is implemented in this system to provide uncentralized accounting and trading platform. With this framework, private data can be traded and the conflict between private data shortage and invasion of privacy can be mitigated. The experiment demonstrates the feasibility of the proposed TBDCT.

Aleksandr Zelensky, Viacheslav Voronin, Evgeny A. Semenishchev, Iliya Svirin · 5 authors

In distributed high-performance systems that allow processing large data sets, the important task is the analysis and verification of the video data. The problem of confirming data is relevant for many areas. The need for this arises when fixing offences, banking, remote management, confirmation of actions, etc. In this paper, we describe an approach to verifying video received by a mobile device like mobile phone, tablet or PC, equipped with a camera and controlled by the operating system (Windows, Android or iOS). The proposed algorithm uses the procedure of entering the Swype code using the movement mobile camera. To improving the accuracy, we use additional information from different mobile sensors like accelerometer, gyro, barometer, and GPS. In the process of data verification, video transmission to the server is not perform what ensures the privacy of the captured video data. The server and mobile device stores data about the file size, the date of its recording, the time, the data device and its position.

Kavita Saini

The increase use of the Internet and digital currency by layman around has given direction to many researchers to evaluate its effectiveness and applications. The blockchain's effectiveness includes the increased security, transparency, cost reduction, of various transactions taking place in real life.The paper discuss about the emerging technology blockchain. Blockchain a cryptographically secure digital currency and can perhaps transform how the world works. The paper discuss about the challenges and how digital transformation is taking place. Paper also discuss about the future scope of Blockchain.

Rourab Paul, Paresh Baidya, Suman Sau, Krishanu Maity · 6 authors

Standard security protocols are heavy weight interms of memory foot prints which make all the security protocol unfit for budgeted platforms such as Internet of Things (IoT). The blockchain (BC) is a very efficient architecture to preserve five basic cryptographic primitives, such as authenticity, integrity, confidentiality, availability and non-repudiation. Conventional adoption of blockchain in IoT causes significant energy consumption, delay, and computational overhead which are not suitable for various resource-constrained IoT devices. In our submission we change the basic architecture of blockchain and make it more efficient for IoT application. The article proposes an IoT based smart city architecture which adopted the blockchain technology preserving all the cryptographic security issues. The adoption of blockchain causes very minimal overhead on IoT platform. Comparison of all security parameters with existing literature shows that the architecture is reasonably efficient in terms of security

Ashish Singh, Kakali Chatterjee

In todays digital environment, the voting system move from paper based to a digital system. A digital e-voting system have many properties such as transparency, decentralization, irreversibility, and non-repudiation. The growth in digital e-voting system arises many security and transparency issues. In this paper, we used the blockchain technology in digital e-voting system to solve the security issues and fulfill the system requirements. It offers new opportunities to deploy a secure e-voting system in any organization or country. The solution is far better as compared to other solution because, it is a decentralized system, contain the results in the form of bit-coins, having different locations. We will also analyze the security of our proposed voting system, which shows our protocol is more secure as compared to other solutions.

Kristián Košťál, Tomáš Krupa, Martin Gembec, Igor Veres · 6 authors

This article is focused on the area of energy efficiency of cryptocurrencies. Nowadays, nearly two thirds of all cryptocurrencies use Proof of Work (PoW) consensus algorithm to add new blocks to blockchain network. The energy sustainability of whole networks using PoW algorithm is very doubtful. Furthermore, we can see that lots of cryptocurrencies are trying to implement and move to more efficient consensus algorithms like Proof of Stake (PoS). Therefore, in this article we present three potential scenarios to perform transition between PoW and PoS.

Pavel V. Sukharev, Dmitry S. Silnov

Cryptocurrency mining is an important process that ensures the reliability of cryptocurrency system. A significant computing power is used in cryptocurrency mining. One of the most important tasks in cryptocurrency mining is to ensure the maximum performance of used computing capacities. In this paper we review the existing Ethereum mining algorithm and search for possibilities for speeding up the mining by applying a new asynchronous mining algorithm.

Juha Partala

Blockchain is a public open ledger that provides data integrity in a distributed manner. It is the underlying technology of cryptocurrencies and an increasing number of related applications, such as smart contracts. The open nature of blockchain together with strong integrity guarantees on the stored data makes it a compelling platform for covert communication. In this paper, we suggest a method of securely embedding covert messages into a blockchain. We formulate a simplified ideal blockchain model based on existing implementations and devise a protocol that enables two parties to covertly communicate through the blockchain following that model. We also formulate a rigorous definition for the security and covertness of such a protocol based on computational indistinguishability. Finally, we show that our method satisfies this definition in the random oracle model for the underlying cryptographic hash function.

Wei Bi, Xiaoyun Jia, Maolin Zheng

Most cryptocurrency systems or systems based on blockchain technology are currently using the elliptic curves digital signature algorithm (ECDSA) on the secp256k1 curve, which is susceptible to backdoors implemented by the curve creator (secp256k1). The paper proposes a multiple elliptic curves digi-tal signature algorithm (MECDSA), which allows not only for setting the number of elliptic curves according to practical security requirements, but also for editing the parameters of each elliptic curve. The performance analy-sis proves that the scheme is secure and efficient, and can avoid any back-doors implemented by curve creators. We suggest that the systems based on blockchain should operate in two elliptic curves considering the contradic-tion between security and efficiency.

Jan Rüth, Torsten Zimmermann, Konrad Wolsing, Oliver Hohlfeld

Mining is the foundation of blockchain-based cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin rewarding the miner for finding blocks for new transactions. The Monero currency enables mining with standard hardware in contrast to special hardware (ASICs) as often used in Bitcoin, paving the way for in-browser mining as a new revenue model for website operators. In this work, we study the prevalence of this new phenomenon. We identify and classify mining websites in 138M domains and present a new fingerprinting method which finds up to a factor of 5.7 more miners than publicly available block lists. Our work identifies and dissects Coinhive as the major browser-mining stakeholder. Further, we present a new method to associate mined blocks in the Monero blockchain to mining pools and uncover that Coinhive currently contributes 1.18% of mined blocks having turned over 1293 Moneros in June 2018.

Nazrul M. Ahmad, Abdul Razak, Subarmaniam Kannan, Ibrahim Yusof · 5 authors

Identity Management (IDM) in cloud-based Internet-of-Things (IoT) applications is critical in many businesses. However, most conventional IDM systems are costly and hinder the innovation and greater customer experience. By using blockchain, a new way of managing the identities is proposed. This paper presents an initiative to improve IDM by integrating face recognition approach and blockchain technology in an integrated IoT -cloud application. To illustrate the proposed initiative, a decentralized campus wide printing service is chosen as a use case. In this use case, face recognition is used as an entry point to the service. Since face recognition involves a lot of complex computations and machine learning, this process is executed on a cloudlet, hence minimizing the need for massive data transfer to a distant cloud. Once a user's login information is digitally verified via immutable blockchain, smart contract is deployed to keep track of the user's printing activities. The integration of blockchain in this service has decentralized the IDM, automated the service, and kept the service inexpensive and transparent.

Zhaofeng Ma, Weihua Huang, Wei Bi, Hongmin Gao · 5 authors

Upon flaws of current blockchain platforms of heavyweight, large capacity of ledger, and time-consuming of synchronization of data, in this paper, we proposed a new paradigm of master-slave blockchain scheme (MSB) for pervasive computing that suitable for general PC, mobile device such as smart phones or PADs to participants in the working of mining and verification, in which we separated traditional blockchain model in 2 layer defined as master node layer and a series of slavery agents layer, then we proposed 2 approaches for partially computing model(P-CM) and non-computing of model(NCM) in the MSB blockchain, Finally large amounts of simulations manifest the proposed master-slave blockchain scheme is feasible, extendible and suitable for pervasive computing especially in the 5G generation environment, and can apply in the DRM-related applications.

Sudarshan S. Chawathe

Blockchains such as those used by the Bitcoin and Ethereum cryptocurrencies provide a global, observable record of all transactions and associated data. Analyzing blockchain data is useful for tasks such as detecting fraudulent activities, studying the use and growth of the system, and understanding its levels of anonymity and traceability. Such analysis is challenging due to the high volume and rapidly changing characteristics of popular blockchains. In particular, online (soft real-time) analysis of blockchains requires methods that adapt organically to changes in the data. This paper describes such a method based on self-organizing maps and reports on experiments using the Bitcoin blockchain data.

Qin Liu, Qingchen Guan, Xiaowen Yang, Hongming Zhu · 6 authors

Blockchain is the underlying technology of Bitcoin. It is considered a prospect by industries such as finance, education and healthcare, due to its decentralization and non-tampering features. In the current Education-Industry cooperation, substantive information asymmetry exists between universities and employing companies. Student credit systems and the historical information data chain need urgent establishment and maintenance. The paper makes use of the transparency and non-tampering features of the blockchain system to implement an Education-Industry cooperative system based on the blockchain Hyperledger framework. Using the Certificate Authority service and transactions in the Hyperledger framework, the system simulates the roles of universities and companies in the system, and enables universities and enterprises to share information transparently, which achieves information symmetry among student skill and knowledge information, demands of enterprise recruitment, and current market trends. This offers a significant attempt on the application of blockchain technology to Education-Industry cooperation as a pilot development for technology deployment.

Jia Kan, Shangzhe Chen, Xin Huang

Blockchain technology is ushering in another break-out year, the challenge of blockchain still remains to be solved. This paper analyzes the features of Bitcoin and Bitcoin-NG system based on blockchain, proposes an improved method of implementing blockchain systems by replacing the structure of the original chain with the graph data structure. It was named GraphChain. Each block represents a transaction and contains the balance status of the traders. Additionally, as everyone knows all the transactions in Bitcoin system will be baled by only one miner that will result in a lot of wasted effort, so another way to improve resource utilization is to change the original way to compete for miner to election and parallel mining. Researchers simulated blockchain with graph structure and parallel mining through python, and suggested the conceptual new graph model which can improve both capacity and performance.

S Ramani, Sri Vishva E, Lakshit Dua, Arya Abrol · 5 authors

No abstract is available for this record.

Deeraj Nagothu, Ronghua Xu, Seyed Yahya Nikouei, Yu Chen

While the smart surveillance system enhanced by the Internet of Things (IoT) technology becomes an essential part of Smart Cities, it also brings new concerns in security of the data. Compared to the traditional surveillance systems that is built following a monolithic architecture to carry out lower level operations, such as monitoring and recording, the modern surveillance systems are expected to support more scalable and decentralized solutions for advanced video stream analysis at the large volumes of distributed edge devices. In addition, the centralized architecture of the conventional surveillance systems is vulnerable to single point of failure and privacy breach owning to the lack of protection to the surveillance feed. This position paper introduces a novel secure smart surveillance system based on microservices architecture and blockchain technology. Encapsulating the video analysis algorithms as various independent microservices not only isolates the video feed from different sectors, but also improve the system availability and robustness by decentralizing the operations. The blockchain technology securely synchronizes the video analysis databases among microservices across surveillance domains, and provides tamper proof of data in the trustless network environment. Smart contract enabled access authorization strategy prevents any unauthorized user from accessing the microservices and offers a scalable, decentralized and fine-grained access control solution for smart surveillance systems.

Seyed Yahya Nikouei, Ronghua Xu, Deeraj Nagothu, Yu Chen · 6 authors

Information from surveillance video is essential for situational awareness (SAW). Nowadays, a prohibitively large amount of surveillance data is being generated continuously by ubiquitously distributed video sensors. It is very challenging to immediately identify the objects of interest or zoom in suspicious actions from thousands of video frames. Making the big data indexable is critical to tackle this problem. It is ideal to generate pattern indexes in a real-time, on-site manner on the video streaming instead of depending on the batch processing at the cloud centers. The modern edge-fog-cloud computing paradigm allows implementation of time sensitive tasks at the edge of the network. The on-site edge devices collect the information sensed in format of frames and extracts useful features. The near-site fog nodes conduct the contextualization and classification of the features. The remote cloud center is in charge of more data intensive and computing intensive tasks. However, exchanging the index information among devices in different layers raises security concerns where an adversary can capture or tamper with features to mislead the surveillance system. In this paper, a blockchain enabled scheme is proposed to protect the index data through an encrypted secure channel between the edge and fog nodes. It reduces the chance of attacks on the small edge and fog devices. The feasibility of the proposal is validated through intensive experimental analysis.

Kimmo Halunen, Visa Vallivaara, Anni Karinsalo

Blockchain as a new technology has created a great amount of hype and hope for different applications. There is a promise of a better, decentralised trust based on strict guarantees from cryptography. However, there is a great similarity in the structure of blockchains and classical iterated hash functions of the Merkle-Damgård (M-D) type. As the structure of M-D type hash functions has been extensively studied and many different structural weaknesses have been exposed, it is plausible to think that blockchains also share these structural problems. In this paper, we present the most relevant problems of M-D type hash functions and their relation to blockchains. We also examine how these might affect currently established blockchains. Our results can help in avoiding some problems in the design of new blockchain systems and also provide some (theoretical) limits on the trustworthiness of current blockchains.