The coming era of autonomous AI agents demands a discovery mechanism capable of navigating millions of tools, yet existing solutions buckle under \( \mathcal{O}(N) \) complexity and centralized governance. Instead of building another fragile overlay, we propose ToolDNS, a radical framework that retrofits semantic tool discovery onto the Internet's most resilient substrate: the Domain Name System (DNS). By embedding functional intent and organizational trust into a hierarchical namespace, ToolDNS transforms an expensive semantic search into a series of lightweight, \( \mathcal{O}(\log N) \) name resolutions. We introduce three protocol-compliant enhancements to enable decentralized governance and semantic pruning: partially unfolded names, EDNS0 intent payloads, and logical subdomains. To rigorously evaluate this approach across the fragmented tooling landscape, we construct and release a large-scale heterogeneous benchmark comprising \( 33,688 \) real-world tools spanning MCP, A2A, RESTful, and Skill protocols. On this dataset, ToolDNS slashes the per-query search space by \( 95.26\% \) while matching state-of-the-art retrieval accuracy. Furthermore, its UDP-native design reduces discovery latency by orders of magnitude compared to HTTP-based registries. Our work demonstrates that scalable AI interoperability requires not more middleware, but a smarter utilization of the infrastructure already beneath our feet.
Memory-enabled large language model (LLM) agents, particularly those deployed in long-horizon, tool-using settings such as Web3-style autonomous workflows, introduce security risks that extend beyond single-prompt injection. By persisting and reusing information across interaction steps and sessions, these agents enable memory poisoning attacks in which adversarial inputs modify persistent agent state and influence future decisions after benign intermediate interactions. Recent work on context manipulation and “fake memories” demonstrates that adversarial content can be injected into an agent’s prompt-visible inputs or persistent memory; however, existing evaluations largely analyze such attacks at isolated interaction steps or static context snapshots, obscuring their temporal dynamics. In this paper, we present the first large-scale, trajectory-level measurement framework for analyzing temporal memory poisoning in memory-enabled LLM agents. We construct a schema-constrained dataset of 2,614 multi-step attack trajectories spanning four attack families,chain poisoning, policy rewriting, backdoor triggering, andslow drift, executed over shared persistent memory. We define temporal risk metrics over multi-step interaction trajectories that capture delayed activation, non-monotonic escalation, and the earliest point at which attacks become distinguishable from benign behavior. Our empirical results show that a substantial fraction of attacks remain indistinguishable from benign behavior until late-stage activation, despite exhibiting low or medium risk at all earlier steps. Slow-drift and backdoor-trigger attacks, in particular, systematically evade step-local evaluation until terminal interactions, while chain poisoning and policy rewriting exhibit non-monotonic risk trajectories. These findings demonstrate that memory poisoning risk is inherently temporal and cannot be reliably assessed using prompt-level or step-isolated evaluation, motivating trajectory-aware benchmarks for agent security.
The investigation of cryptocurrency crimes is still in its infancy with no standardised process or methodology to follow. This paper describes research that forms part of a broader project led by the second author (Botha, et al., 2025). The broader project’s aim is to develop a methodology to follow when conducting cryptocurrency crime investigations. One of the steps in the proposed methodology is web scraping. The authors of this paper present a detailed exploration of web scraping techniques within the broader context of the proposed investigation methodology. In this paper, the focus is on developing a well-structured methodology for scraping social media platforms and online forums to gather data related to fraudulent activities; the goal is to find posts that include references to the wallet address of interest. This exploration uses an iterative approach; for every new cryptocurrency wallet address discovered or revealed through on-chain analysis, a parallel path is followed by scraping the Internet. If a mention of the cryptocurrency address should be discovered it is considered to be a key finding, creating a pivot point in the investigation. From a pivot point, further open-source intelligence (OSINT) techniques will be applied, though this aspect falls beyond the scope of this paper. If no relevant information or link is found, the scraping path will not be pursued, and the investigation proceeds with on-chain analysis to identify additional wallet addresses. Additionally, challenges encountered in web scraping, such as handling platform restrictions, ensuring data accuracy, and managing large volumes of data, are addressed. The goal of the proposed methodology is to enhance data extraction and analysis efficiency contributing to the proposed methodology for investigating cryptocurrency scams.
Che, Zheng, Taoyu Li, Meng Shen, Hanbiao Du · 5 authors
The untraceability of transactions facilitated by Ethereum mixing services like Tornado Cash poses significant challenges to blockchain security and financial regulation. Existing methods for correlating mixing accounts suffer from limited labeled data and vulnerability to noisy annotations, which restrict their practical applicability. In this paper, we propose StealthLink, a novel framework that addresses these limitations through cross-task domain-invariant feature learning. Our key innovation lies in transferring knowledge from the well-studied domain of blockchain anomaly detection to the data-scarce task of mixing transaction tracing. Specifically, we design a MixFusion module that constructs and encodes mixing subgraphs to capture local transactional patterns, while introducing a knowledge transfer mechanism that aligns discriminative features across domains through adversarial discrepancy minimization. This dual approach enables robust feature learning under label scarcity and distribution shifts. Extensive experiments on real-world mixing transaction datasets demonstrate that StealthLink achieves state-of-the-art performance, with 96.98\% F1-score in 10-shot learning scenarios. Notably, our framework shows superior generalization capability in imbalanced data conditions than conventional supervised methods. This work establishes the first systematic approach for cross-domain knowledge transfer in blockchain forensics, providing a practical solution for combating privacy-enhanced financial crimes in decentralized ecosystems.
In its present form, traditional Web2 domain infrastructures have become vulnerable to increasing amounts of censorship, security breaches, and centralized authority exclusively handled by third party Certificate Authorities (CAs). These weaknesses and the single points of failure inherent, under spotlight give out the necessity of migrating to a safer decentralized Web3 model. Mygrate was developed using solidity, Hedera and hardhat. This paper elucidates Mygrate development, features, and applications. It offers a functionality to bridge Web2 domains with Web3 architecture by utilizing SSL certificates in combination with smart contracts to map domains to cryptographically signed InterPlanetary File System (IPFS) addresses, verified over decentralized blockchains such as Hedera. By solving a major part of the oracle problem, Mygrate emerged as an innovative solution, leveraging the power of Hedera Blockchain. This paper delves into the comprehensive development journey of Mygrate. It allows us to bring web2 hosted domain name source of trust and offset authenticity to web3 for easy identifiability. Moreover, there is increased security, decreased oracle fees, and money goes directly to the data providers who provide data as a public good. Through the integration of libraries like Ethereum-Waffle, ethers, chai,node-forge, Mygrate offers Oracle-free SSL verification, EVM assembly optimization, Frontrunning mitigation, gas optimization and security.
The advent of Web 3.0 is accompanied by the growing popularity of blockchain, cryptoassets, and various on-chain economic activities. Decentralized blockchain technology not only creates a thriving cryptoassets market, generating enormous wealth due to investors’ enthusiasm for cryptocurrencies, but also presents significant challenges for tax administration due to its unique features of decentralized control, anonymity, valuation volatility, and hybrid characteristics. In recent years, while many jurisdictions have issued tax regulations or guidance to help investors understand their tax obligations related to cryptoassets, there is no universally adopted approach to taxing cryptoassets. This chapter discusses the taxation of cryptoassets by examining the taxability of cryptocurrencies and exploring the tax implications of the metaverse and decentralized finance. Additionally, this chapter provides an overview of the latest developments in information reporting concerning cryptoassets.
Ben Biedermann, Matthew Scerri, Victoria Kozlova, Joshua Ellul
Web3’s decentralised infrastructure has upended the standardised approach to digital identity established by protocols like OpenID Connect. Web2 and Web3 currently operate in silos, with Web2 leveraging selective disclosure JSON web tokens (SD-JWTs) and Web3 dApps being reliant on on-chain data and sometimes clinging to centralised system data. This fragmentation hinders user esxperience and the interconnectedness of the digital world. This article explores the integration of Web3 within the OpenID Connect framework, scrutinising established authentication protocols for their adaptability to decentralised identities. The research examines the interplay between OpenID Connect and decentralised identity concepts, the limitations of the existing protocols like OpenID Connect for verifiable credential issuance, OpenID Connect framework for verifiable presentations, and self-issued OpenID provider. As a result, a novel privacy-preserving digital identity bridge is proposed, which aims to answer the research question of whether authentication protocols should inherently support Web3 functionalities and the mechanisms for their integration. Through a Decentralised Autonomous Organisation (DAO) use case, the findings indicate that a privacy-centric bridge can mitigate the existing fragmentation by aggregating different identities to provide a better user experience. While the digital identity bridge demonstrates a possible approach to harmonise digital identity across platforms for their use in Web3, the bridging is unidirectional and limits root trust of credentials. The bridge’s dependence on centralised systems may further fuel the debate on (de)centralised identities.
Money laundering using cryptocurrency poses significant threats to the blockchain ecosystem. Due to the decentralized and anonymous nature of cryptocurrencies, detecting such laundering activities is difficult. Although substantial research has been conducted, almost all existing methods detect cryptocurrency laundering from an individual perspective, ignoring the fact that money laundering is typically a group behavior. Group information should be very helpful in laundering behavior analysis, but such laundering groups are hard to be recognized due to anonymity and diversity of purposes of cryptocurrency transactions. To address this challenge, we design a multi-persona grouping algorithm that can effectively group accounts into persona subgraphs. Then, we extract two subgraph features: cycle basis number and cycle overlapping ratio, and build an unsupervised model to evaluate laundering scores of each subgraph. Extensive experiments on both synthetic and real-world datasets demonstrate that, compared with existing methods, our proposed method can improve detection accuracy by 17.4 percentage points on average. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first work on group-based detection of cryptocurrency laundering.
Jan 1, 2025·Proceedings of the ... Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences/Proceedings of the Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences
The internet is evolving from Web2's centralized model, dominated by a few tech giants, to Web3's decentralized future. Web3 dismantles walled gardens, distributing data and applications across a peer-to-peer network. Imagine information not on a single server, but replicated across countless computers. This fosters transparency and eliminates censorship. Users, not platforms, own their data. Web3 empowers creators - artists can issue tokens tied to their work, allowing fans to directly support them and even own a piece. Tokens act as the fuel for a new economy, rewarding users for contributing to projects and fostering a more collaborative online experience. This shift towards decentralization has the potential to create a more equitable and user-centric internet, one where power lies not with corporations, but with the users themselves.
Purpose Advancements in Internet technologies greatly influence digital humanities, yet research investigating web3 (i.e. the blockchain-based, decentralised web) within that domain remains limited. The purpose of this paper is to address that gap, presenting a state-of-the-art synthesis of web3-related technologies for digital humanities infrastructures and exploring associated risks and challenges. Design/methodology/approach Following a review of the literature, the authors scope out ways blockchain technology, peer-to-peer decentralised storage and other web3 technologies could support digital humanities infrastructures, especially in the context of digital cultural heritage. In this discussion, particular cognisance is given to the needs and aims of the UK’s Arts and Humanities Research Council funded Towards a National Collection programme, which seeks to break down the barriers that exist between the UK’s cultural heritage collections. Findings Web3 introduces novel tools and processes that could benefit digital humanities infrastructures, enabling decentralisation and facilitating open access data storage. Yet, significant barriers to adoption remain, such as the requirement for highly specialised technical expertise. Risks and challenges must also be considered prior to any use, including legal, ethical and technical safeguards. Research limitations/implications This study explores opportunities and risks of web3 for digital humanities, through the lens of digital cultural heritage infrastructures and their requirements, including decentralised storage and persistent identification. It does not provide a holistic overview of all web3 technologies. Practical implications The authors identify practical uses of web3 technologies for digital humanities projects, outlining potential applications concerning decentralised storage and persistent identification. Originality/value The authors push forward current knowledge and literature on the intersection of web3 and digital humanities, outlining also practical recommendations for scholars, practitioners and funding organisations.
Ken Huang, Youwei Yang, Fan Zhang, Xi Chen · 5 authors
Chapter 2 leverages first principles thinking to reveal the seismic shift enabled by Web3’s self-sovereign Internet and decentralized economic architecture. Opportunities emerge in infrastructure, access, efficiency, accountability, and empowerment. On-chain data sharing and self-sovereign identity allow efficient bootstrapping in an open ecosystem. Decentralized finance increases financial access, while blockchain ID could facilitate inclusive programs such as universal basic income. By automating manual workflows, smart contracts and traceability boost efficiency. Immutable blockchain ledgers enhance transparency via innovations such as triple-entry accounting. The creator economy shifts power by enabling direct content monetization and ownership through NFT marketplaces, decentralized social platforms, and games. Despite adoption hurdles, Web3 fundamentally reshapes incentives around user control over identity, data, and value creation in a decentralized economy. Capturing the full potential requires reimagining economic systems, not just optimizing current models. This epochal shift promises to unlock tremendous value by aligning technology with empowerment in an open, user-centric Internet.
The rapid increase in the number of electric vehicles (EVs) has resulted in huge fuel tax losses for governments every year. Many countries have levied taxes based on the annual or monthly travel record (TR) submitted by the EV. On the one hand, TR contains important private information, such as the time, locations, and trajectories of EV owners. On the other hand, EV owners may forge TR to reduce taxes. Therefore, the verification protocol of TR requires extremely high security and effectiveness. To solve this outstanding issue, this paper proposes a V2I-SNARK protocol that combines vehicle-to-infrastructure communications (V2I) and zk-SNARK for TR verification of EVs. V2I -SNARK is divided into two stages, the trusted setup stage and the TR verification stage. In the former stage, a trusted authority (TA) will generate the proof key and verification key for verification and store them on the verification server (Verifier). In the latter stage, EV will use the proof key to generate a randomized proof, and the verifier will use the verification key to verify the proof. Regarding the performance of the V2I -SNARK protocol, we first provide security proofs for completeness, soundness, and zero-knowledge properties. Furthermore, we compare the verification efficiency, energy consumption, computational complexity, and other performance of V2I-SNARK with the benchmark protocols. The results show that the proposed V2I-SNARK protocol outperforms other protocols in terms of verification efficiency and energy consumption.
In today’s digital age, the verification of documents is a critical aspect of numerous transactions and processes across various industries. However, traditional methods of document verification are often susceptible to fraud, tampering, and inefficiencies. In response to these challenges, this project proposes a novel solution leveraging blockchain technology to enhance the security and integrity of document verification processes. The objective of this project is to develop a decentralized system for document verification using blockchain, aiming to provide a secure, transparent, and tamper-proof platform for verifying the authenticity of digital documents. By harnessing the immutable and transparent nature of blockchain, the proposed system seeks to address the shortcomings of traditional verification methods and establish a trusted environment for document verification. Key features of the proposed system include the use of cryptographic hashing techniques to create unique digital fingerprints for each document, which are then stored on a blockchain network. Smart contracts are utilized to automate the verification process, enabling seamless and transparent verification without the need for intermediaries.The methodology involves the design and implementation of the blockchain-based document verification platform, incorporating essential components such as user authentication, document uploading, verification, and retrieval functionalities. The system is developed using Ethereum, a popular blockchain platform, and is deployed on a test network for evaluation and testing. Results from experimental testing demonstrate the effectiveness and reliability of the proposed system in providing tamper-proof document verification services. Furthermore, comparative analysis with existing centralized solutions highlights the advantages of blockchain-based verification in terms of security, transparency, and efficiency.
2 source records
Web Data Mining and Analysis
Semantic Web and Ontologies
Mathematics, Computing, and Information Processing
Konrad Weiss, Christof Ferreira Torres, Florian Wendland
Ethereum smart contracts are executable programs deployed on a blockchain. Once deployed, they cannot be updated due to their inherent immutability. Moreover, they often manage valuable assets that are worth millions of dollars, making them attractive targets for attackers. The introduction of vulnerabilities in programs due to the reuse of vulnerable code posted on Q&A websites such as Stack Overflow is not a new issue. However, little effort has been made to analyze the extent of this issue on deployed smart contracts. In this paper, we conduct a study on the impact of vulnerable code reuse from Q&A websites during the development of smart contracts and provide tools uniquely fit to detect vulnerable code patterns in complete and incomplete Smart Contract code. This paper proposes a pattern-based vulnerability detection tool that is able to analyze code snippets (i.e., incomplete code) as well as full smart contracts based on the concept of code property graphs. We also propose a methodology that leverages fuzzy hashing to quickly detect code clones of vulnerable snippets among deployed smart contracts. Our results show that our vulnerability search, as well as our code clone detection, are comparable to state-of-the-art while being applicable to code snippets. Our large-scale study on 18,660 code snippets reveals that 4,596 of them are vulnerable, out of which 616 can be found in 7,852 deployed smart contracts. These results highlight that the reuse of vulnerable code snippets is indeed an issue in currently deployed smart contracts.
Private information retrieval (PIR) over Web 3.0 introduces a sophisticated dimension to data access and privacy protection. It enables users to retrieve specific information from databases without disclosing the exact data being accessed. In decentralized networks, where privacy and data security are critical, PIR techniques play a pivotal role in safeguarding user confidentiality. By employing cryptographic protocols, PIR ensures that users can query decentralized databases while preserving anonymity and preventing unauthorized data interception. This chapter delves into the intricate mechanics of PIR algorithms tailored for Web 3.0 environments, exploring how these techniques facilitate secure information retrieval and uphold privacy standards amidst distributed ledger technologies and decentralized applications (dApps). It examines the integration of PIR within emerging decentralized search engines, highlighting the advancements and challenges in deploying privacy-preserving mechanisms across decentralized networks.
Amir M. Ebrahimi, Bram Adams, Gustavo A. Oliva, Ahmed E. Hassan
The proxy pattern is a well-known design pattern with numerous use cases in several sectors of the software industry. As such, the use of the proxy pattern is also a common approach in the development of complex decentralized applications (DApps) on the Ethereum blockchain. Despite the importance of proxy contracts, little is known about (i) how their prevalence changed over time, (ii) the ways in which developers integrate proxies in the design of DApps, and (iii) what proxy types are being most commonly leveraged by developers. This study bridges these gaps through a comprehensive analysis of Ethereum smart contracts, utilizing a dataset of 50 million contracts and 1.6 billion transactions as of September 2022. Our findings reveal that 14.2% of all deployed smart contracts are proxy contracts. We show that proxy contracts are being more actively used than non-proxy contracts. Also, the usage of proxy contracts in various contexts, transactions involving proxy contracts, and adoption of proxy contracts by users have shown an upward trend over time, peaking at the end of our study period. They are either deployed through off-chain scripts or on-chain factory contracts, with the former and latter being employed in 39.1% and 60.9% of identified usage contexts in turn. We found that while the majority (67.8%) of proxies act as an interceptor, 32.2% enables upgradeability. Proxy contracts are typically (79%) implemented based on known reference implementations with 29.4% being of type ERC-1167, a class of proxies that aims to cheaply reuse and clone contracts' functionality. Our evaluation shows that our proposed behavioral proxy detection method has a precision and recall of 100% in detecting active proxies. Finally, we derive a set of practical recommendations for developers and introduce open research questions to guide future research on the topic.
The greatest advantage that Web3 applications offer over Web 2.0 is the evolution of the data access layer. Opaque, centralized services that compelled trust from users are replaced by trustless, decentralized systems of smart contracts. However, the public nature of blockchain-based databases, on which smart contracts transact, has typically presented a challenge for applications that depend on data privacy or that rely on participants having incomplete information. This has changed with the introduction of confidential smart contract networks that encrypt the memory state of active contracts as well as their databases stored on-chain. With confidentiality, contracts can more readily implement novel interaction mechanisms that were previously infeasible. Meanwhile, in both Web 2.0 and Web3 applications the user interface continues to play a crucial role in translating user intent into actionable requests. In many cases, developers have shifted intelligence and autonomy into the client-side, leveraging Web technologies for compute, graphics, and networking. Web3's reliance on such frontends has revealed a pain point though, namely that decentralized applications are not accessible to end users without a persistent host serving the application. Here we introduce the Non-Fungible Program (NFP) model for developing self-contained frontend applications that are distributed via blockchain, powered by Web technology, and backed by private databases persisted in encrypted smart contracts. Access to frontend code, as well as backend services, is controlled and guaranteed by smart contracts according to the NFT ownership model, eliminating the need for a separate host. By extension, NFP applications bring interactivity to token owners and enable new functionalities, such as authorization mechanisms for oracles, supplementary Web services, and overlay networks in a secure manner. In addition...