Scalability Analysis of Blockchains Through Blockchain Simulation

The past decade has witnessed a surge of cryptocurrencies such as bitcoins, litecoin, dogecoin, peercoin, bitcoin being the most popular amongst them. Enthusiasts and skeptics have debated and come up with disparate opinions to contest both the success and failures of such currencies. However, the veracity of such opinions can only be derived after true analysis of the technological breakthroughs that have occurred in this domain. Blockchains being the backbone of such currencies is a broad subject that encompasses economics, law, cryptography and software engineering. Most of these technologies are decentralized and are open source algorithms. Blockchains popularity is largely based on its tremendous potential of carrying huge amount of data securely over a peer to peer network. This feature of blockchains has leveraged its value in the market for many companies who want to use blockchains for enterprise goals and profit making. For a more comprehensive understanding of blockchains and how the block generation algorithm works , how transactions are included in a block we must understand the genesis of the blockchain technology, what exactly it represents and its relevance to the real world. Despite its advantages, blockchains still remain a novel technology and their remains areas of concerns that can be bettered for attaining ideal efficiency. This research delves into the scalability issue of blockchains and provides a comparative analysis of several blockchain parameters with real time data . It delves into the factors that make block chains largely non-scalable. This is done by the simulation of blockchain. It then addresses the various mechanisms that can be employed to resolve this limitation through measuring the differences between the simulator and real time scenarios

Безопасность протокола поиска и верификации в многомерном блокчейне

The issue of secure data exchange and performing external transactions between robust distributed ledgers has recently been among the most significant in the sphere of designing and implementing decentralized technologies. Several approaches have been proposed to speed up the process of verifying transactions on adjacent blockchains. The problem of search has not been under research yet. The paper contains security evaluation of data exchange between independent robust distributed ledgers inside multidimensional blockchain. Main principles, basic steps of the protocol and major requirements for it are observed: centralized approach, subset principle and robust SVP. An equivalence of centralized approach and ideal search and verification functionality is proven. The probability of successful verification in case of using fully connected network graph or equivalent approach with fully connected graph between parent and child blockchain is shown. The insecurity of approach with one-to-one links between child and parent ledgers or with a subset principle is proven. A robust search and verification protocol for blocks and transactions based on the features of robust distributed ledgers is presented. The probability of attack on this protocol is mostly defined by the probability of attack on verification and not on search. An approach to protection against an attacker with 50% of nodes in the network is given. It is based on combination of various search and verification techniques.Проблема безопасного обмена информацией и проведения транзакций между устойчивыми распределенными реестрами является одной из наиболее актуальных в сфере проектирования и построения децентрализованных технологий. До настоящего времени были предложены подходы, ориентированные на ускорение проверки цепочки блоков для верификации транзакций в соседних блокчейнах. При этом проблема поиска ранее не затрагивалась. В работе рассмотрен вопрос безопасности обмена данными между самостоятельными устойчивыми распределенными реестрами в рамках многомерного блокчейна. Описаны принципы и основные этапы работы протокола, а также базовые требования, предъявляемые к нему. Предложены способы построения протокола обмена сообщениями для верификации внешних транзакций: централизованный подход, принцип подмножества и стойкий SVP. Доказана эквивалентность централизованного подхода идеальному функционалу поиска и верификации в GUC-моделях. Показана вероятность успешной верификации в случае использования подхода, основанного на подмножествах, при применении полного графа сети или эквивалентного подхода с полным графом между родительским и дочерним блокчейнами. Доказана небезопасность случая со связью 1 к 1 между родительским и дочерним реестром, а также небезопасность подхода, основанного на подмножестве узлов родительского и дочернего реестров. Предложен стойкий протокол поиска и верификации блоков и транзакций, основанный на свойствах стойкости устойчивых распределенных реестров. В значительной степени вероятность атаки определяется вероятностью атаки на процесс верификации, а не на процесс поиска. При необходимости защиты от атакующих, контролирующих до половины узлов в сети, предложен метод комбинации подходов для поиска и верификации блоков и транзакций

Безопасность протокола поиска и верификации в многомерном блокчейне

Проблема безопасного обмена информацией и проведения транзакций между устойчивыми распределенными реестрами является одной из наиболее актуальных в сфере проектирования и построения децентрализованных технологий. До настоящего времени были предложены подходы, ориентированные на ускорение проверки цепочки блоков для верификации транзакций в соседних блокчейнах. При этом проблема поиска ранее не затрагивалась. В работе рассмотрен вопрос безопасности обмена данными между самостоятельными устойчивыми распределенными реестрами в рамках многомерного блокчейна. Описаны принципы и основные этапы работы протокола, а также базовые требования, предъявляемые к нему. Предложены способы построения протокола обмена сообщениями для верификации внешних транзакций: централизованный подход, принцип подмножества и стойкий SVP. Доказана эквивалентность централизованного подхода идеальному функционалу поиска и верификации в GUC-моделях. Показана вероятность успешной верификации в случае использования подхода, основанного на подмножествах, при применении полного графа сети или эквивалентного подхода с полным графом между родительским и дочерним блокчейнами. Доказана небезопасность случая со связью 1 к 1 между родительским и дочерним реестром, а также небезопасность подхода, основанного на подмножестве узлов родительского и дочернего реестров. Предложен стойкий протокол поиска и верификации блоков и транзакций, основанный на свойствах стойкости устойчивых распределенных реестров. В значительной степени вероятность атаки определяется вероятностью атаки на процесс верификации, а не на процесс поиска. При необходимости защиты от атакующих, контролирующих до половины узлов в сети, предложен метод комбинации подходов для поиска и верификации блоков и транзакций

The Ontological Sociology of Cryptocurrency: A Theoretical Exploration of Bitcoin

For millennia, money has been a basal element of everyday life reality in market-organized societies. Albeit money has changed extrinsically (e.g., form, use, utility) countless of times, some intrinsic characteristics remain the same, i.e., money is reified value. But why? What gives money value? Even more crucial, what is money in the first place? This exploratory study delves into the intricacies of money, in particular the revolutionary 21st century pecuniary techno-phenomenon, a cryptocurrency called Bitcoin. Though cryptocurrencies have been the topic of several financial and legal scholarly publications for a few years, we rather focus our analysis on Bitcoin\u27s ontological characteristics under a schema of overlapping theoretical layers: Social Exchange Theory, Marxian Dialectics, and Social Construction of Reality. Our intention is to dissect Bitcoin sociologically and empirically examine its global exchange, consumption, and institutionalization. Consequently, we venture to ask, can Bitcoin redefine the meaning of money and how we relate to it? Reformulate the role of banking? Disrupt the universally accepted objective reality of currency value attached to sensorial experience? Transfer trust from ambivalent human relations to an incorruptible algorithm? Or even become the Internet of money

Blockchain-based Perfect Sharing Project Platform based on the Proof of Atomicity Consensus Algorithm

The Korean government funded 12.8 billion USD to 652 research and development (R&D) projects supported by 20 ministries in 2019. Every year, various organizations are supported to conduct R&D projects focusing on selected core technologies by evaluating emerging technologies which industries are planning to develop. To manage the whole cycle of national R&D projects, information sharing on national R&D projects is very essential. The blockchain technology is considered as a core solution to share information reliably and prevent forgery in various fields. For efficient management of national R&D projects, we enhance and analyse the Perfect Sharing Project (PSP)-Platform based on a new blockchain-based platform for information sharing and forgery prevention. It is a shared platform for national ICT R&D projects management with excellent performance in preventing counterfeiting. As a consensus algorithm is very important to prevent forgery in blockchain, we survey not only architectural aspects and examples of the platform but also the consensus algorithms. Considering characteristics of the PSP-Platform, we adopt an atomic proof (POA) consensus algorithm as a new consensus algorithm in this paper. To prove the validity of the POA consensus algorithm, we have conducted experiments. The experiment results show the outstanding performance of the POA consensus algorithm used in the PSP-Platform in terms of block generation delay and block propagation time

A P2P Networking Simulation Framework For Blockchain Studies

Recently, blockchain becomes a disruptive technology of building distributed applications (DApps). Many researchers and institutions have devoted their resources to the development of more effective blockchain technologies and innovative applications. However, with the limitation of computing power and financial resources, it is hard for researchers to deploy and test their blockchain innovations in a large-scape physical network. Hence, in this dissertation, we proposed a peer-to-peer (P2P) networking simulation framework, which allows to deploy and test (simulate) a large-scale blockchain system with thousands of nodes in one single computer. We systematically reviewed existing research and techniques of blockchain simulator and evaluated their advantages and disadvantages. To achieve generality and flexibility, our simulation framework lays the foundation for simulating blockchain network with different scales and protocols. We verified our simulation framework by deploying the most famous three blockchain systems (Bitcoin, Ethereum and IOTA) in our simulation framework. We demonstrated the effectiveness of our simulation framework with the following three case studies: (a) Improve the performance of blockchain by changing key parameters or deploying new directed acyclic graph (DAG) structure protocol; (b) Test and analyze the attack response of Tangle-based blockchain (IOTA) (c) Establish and deploy a new smart grid bidding system for demand side in our simulation framework. This dissertation also points out a series of open issues for future research

Cryptocurrencies and beyond: using design science research to demonstrate diverse applications of blockchains

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

RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN BLOCKCHAIN CONSENSUS PARAMETERS AND NETWORK EXTERNALITIES

48 pagesLarge-scale decentralized networks have many advantageous fault tolerance properties over their centralized counterparts. These properties enable resiliency in the face of faulty, and even adversarial behavior. Consensus protocols are a way to coordinate state across these networks and are what makes them extremely robust to adversaries. This paper investigates the effectiveness of different consensus protocol designs by examining various questions about the relationships between blockchain consensus parameters and network externalities. In this research we develop a linear regression model to estimate which characteristics of blockchains are associated with the highest levels of byzantine fault tolerance. This quantitative research provides evidence for whether there are statistically significant relationships between aspects of blockchain design and voting power centralization. Finally, we explore what key network metrics are used by node operators in the decision making process to participate in the mining process

Uma Análise Competitiva entre as Tecnologias Blockchain e Tangle para o Projeto de Aplicações IoT / A Competitive Analysis between Blockchain and Tangle Technologies for IoT Application Designs

Este artigo tem por objetivo realizar uma análise competitiva entre as tecnologias Blockchain e Tangle, visando principalmente ao projeto de aplicações IoT. Para tanto, inicialmente é feito um estudo teórico comparativo das estruturas de dados e algoritmos usados para manipular informações sob cada tecnologia. Em seguida, por meio de simulação, diferentes cenários são analisados para aferir o nível de segurança do sistema em termos da inviolabilidade das informações, considerando o emprego de cada tecnologia. Os resultados finais permitem conjecturar que Tangle é uma alternativa mais promissora, além de se constituírem em subsídios para possíveis projetos de aplicações IoT. Conclusões gerais e trabalhos futuros encerram este artigo