The Role of International Rules in Blockchain-Based Cross-Border Commercial Disputes

[excerpt] The concept of online dispute resolution (ODR) is not new. 1 But, with the advent of Web 3.0, the distributed web that facilitates pseudonymous and cross-border transactions via blockchain\u27s distributed ledger technology, 2 the idea of, and pressing need for, appropriate dispute resolution models for blockchain-based disputes to support this novel system of distributed consensus and trust of which blockchain proponents boast, is a primary concern in rapid development. 3 The common goal of each project is to utilize smart contracts to facilitate superior, quicker[,] and less expensive proceedings by eliminating so many of the tedious and protracted trappings of traditional arbitral proceedings, such as the sending and receiving of documents via courier. , Despite myriad approaches, all emerging blockchain-based dispute resolution services (BDR solutions) generally seek to bridge the divide between automated performance mechanisms, like smart contracts, and the human judgment traditionally required to settle legal disputes.5 How our existing legal frameworks must develop to ensure that smart contracts 6 facilitate, rather than frustrate, the parties\u27 intent is a critically important question to ask as the blockchain stack\u27s infrastructure and application layers are being built and, ultimately, scaled. Indeed, interest is high in the race to create alternative dispute resolution mechanisms to resolve disputes arising from blockchain-based commercial transactions that, due to the transnational, borderless, pseudonymous, and distributed nature of blockchain, clearly necessitate international solutions.

Cross-chain Transaction Validation using Lock-and-Key Method for Multi-System Blockchain

Blockchains have profoundly impacted finance and administration, but there are several issues with the current blockchain platforms, including a lack of system interoperability. Currently used blockchain application platforms only work within their networks. Although the underlying concept of all blockchain networks is mainly similar, it involves centralised third-party mediators to transact from other blockchain networks. The current third-party intermediates establish security and trust by keeping track of “account balances” and attesting to the validity of transactions in a centralised ledger. The lack of sufficient inter-blockchain connectivity hinders the mainstream adoption of blockchain. Blockchain technology may be a solid solution for many systems if it grows and works with other systems. For the multi-system blockchain concept to materialise, a mechanism that would connect and communicate with the blockchain systems of various entities in a distributed manner (without any intermediary) while maintaining the property of trust and integrity established by individual blockchains is required. Several methods for verifying cross-chain transactions have been explored in this paper among various blockchains. The efficient verification of cross-chain transactions faces many difficulties, and current research has yet to scratch the surface. In addition to summarising and categorising these strategies, the report also suggests a novel mechanism that gets beyond the existing drawbacks

Prophet: Conflict-Free Sharding Blockchain via Byzantine-Tolerant Deterministic Ordering

Sharding scales throughput by splitting blockchain nodes into parallel groups. However, different shards' independent and random scheduling for cross-shard transactions results in numerous conflicts and aborts, since cross-shard transactions from different shards may access the same account. A deterministic ordering can eliminate conflicts by determining a global order for transactions before processing, as proved in the database field. Unfortunately, due to the intertwining of the Byzantine environment and information isolation among shards, there is no trusted party able to predetermine such an order for cross-shard transactions. To tackle this challenge, this paper proposes Prophet, a conflict-free sharding blockchain based on Byzantine-tolerant deterministic ordering. It first depends on untrusted self-organizing coalitions of nodes from different shards to pre-execute cross-shard transactions for prerequisite information about ordering. It then determines a trusted global order based on stateless ordering and post-verification for pre-executed results, through shard cooperation. Following the order, the shards thus orderly execute and commit transactions without conflicts. Prophet orchestrates the pre-execution, ordering, and execution processes in the sharding consensus for minimal overhead. We rigorously prove the determinism and serializability of transactions under the Byzantine and sharded environment. An evaluation of our prototype shows that Prophet improves the throughput by $3.11\times$ and achieves nearly no aborts on 1 million Ethereum transactions compared with state-of-the-art sharding