Related papers: On decentralized oracles for data availability
The Nakamoto consensus protocol underlying the Bitcoin blockchain uses proof of work as a voting mechanism. Honest miners who contribute hashing power towards securing the chain try to extend the longest chain they are aware of. Despite its…
Today's blockchain landscape is severely fragmented as more and more heterogeneous blockchain platforms have been developed in recent years. These blockchain platforms are not able to interact with each other or with the outside world since…
We investigate the time to consensus in Nakamoto blockchains. Specifically, we consider two competing growth processes, labeled \emph{honest} and \emph{adversarial}, and determine the time after which the honest process permananetly exceeds…
Blockchain consensus is a state whereby each node in a network agrees on the current state of the blockchain. Existing protocols achieve consensus via a contest or voting procedure to select one node as a dictator to propose new blocks.…
Cryptocurrencies are poised to revolutionize the modern economy by democratizing commerce. These currencies operate on top of blockchain-based distributed ledgers. Existing permissionless blockchain-based protocols offer unparalleled…
We analyze how secure a block is after the block becomes $k$-deep, i.e., security-latency, for Nakamoto consensus under an exponential network delay model. We provide the fault tolerance and extensive bounds on safety violation…
Programmable blockchains have long been a hot research topic given their tremendous use in decentralized applications. Smart contracts, using blockchains as their underlying technology, inherit the desired properties such as verifiability,…
The security of blockchain systems depends on the distribution of mining power across participants. If sufficient mining power is controlled by one entity, they can force their own version of events. This may allow them to double spend…
As known, blockchains are traditionally blind to the real world. This implies the reliance on third parties called oracles when extrinsic data is needed for smart contracts. However, reintroducing trust and single point of failure, oracles…
Private blockchain networks are used by enterprises to manage decentralized processes without trusted mediators and without exposing their assets publicly on an open network like Ethereum. Yet external parties that cannot join such networks…
In the white book of Bitcion, Satoshi Nakamoto described a bitcoin system that can realize point-to-point online payment without a third-party organization. After supporting this magical application scenario and subverting the traditional…
The atomic swap protocol allows for the exchange of cryptocurrencies on different blockchains without the need to trust a third-party. However, market participants who desire to hold derivative assets such as options or futures would also…
Blockchain is a type of decentralized distributed database. Unlike traditional relational database management systems, it does not require management or maintenance by a third party. All data management and update processes are open and…
Blockchain is a promising technology for establishing trust in IoT networks, where network nodes do not necessarily trust each other. Cryptographic hash links and distributed consensus mechanisms ensure that the data stored on an immutable…
Opening up data produced by the Internet of Things (IoT) and mobile devices for public utilization can maximize their economic value. Challenges remain in the trustworthiness of the data sources and the security of the trading process,…
Bitcoin provides freshness properties by forming a blockchain where each block is associated with its timestamp and the previous block. Due to these properties, the Bitcoin protocol is being used as a decentralized, trusted, and secure…
Blockchain has received great attention in recent years and motivated innovations in different scenarios. However, many vital issues which affect its performance are still open. For example, it is widely convinced that high level of…
Many blockchain-based protocols, such as Bitcoin, implement a decentralized asset transfer (or exchange) system. As clearly stated in the original paper by Nakamoto, the crux of this problem lies in prohibiting any participant from engaging…
Many blockchain-based algorithms, such as Bitcoin, implement a decentralized asset transfer system, often referred to as a cryptocurrency. As stated in the original paper by Nakamoto, at the heart of these systems lies the problem of…
The public blockchain was originally conceived to process monetary transactions in a peer-to-peer network while preventing double-spending. It has since been extended to numerous other applications including execution of programs that exist…