Related papers: Bitcoin covenants unchained
Proof of work blockchain protocols using multiple hash types are considered. It is proven that the security region of such a protocol cannot be the AND of a 51\% attack on all the hash types. Nevertheless, a protocol called Merged Bitcoin…
This paper outlines key design principles of Scilla---an intermediate-level language for verified smart contracts. Scilla provides a clean separation between the communication aspect of smart contracts on a blockchain, allowing for the rich…
The rapid evolution of blockchain technology has brought together stakeholders from fundamentally different backgrounds. The result is a diverse ecosystem, as exemplified by the development of a wide range of different blockchain protocols.…
Cryptocurrencies, based on and led by Bitcoin, have shown promise as infrastructure for pseudonymous online payments, cheap remittance, trustless digital asset exchange, and smart contracts. However, Bitcoin-derived blockchain protocols…
Large scale cryptocurrencies require the participation of millions of participants and support economic activity of billions of dollars, which has led to new lines of work in binary Byzantine Agreement (BBA) and consensus. The new work aims…
Smart Contract Templates support legally-enforceable smart contracts, using operational parameters to connect legal agreements to standardised code. In this paper, we explore the design landscape of potential formats for storage and…
Bitcoin is a decentralised digital currency that relies on cryptography rather than trusted third parties such as central banks for its security. Underpinning the operation of the currency is a peer-to-peer (P2P) network that facilitates…
We study decentralized cryptocurrency protocols in which the participants do not deplete physical scarce resources. Such protocols commonly rely on Proof of Stake, i.e., on mechanisms that extend voting power to the stakeholders of the…
Bitcoin is the first implementation of what has become known as a 'public permissionless' blockchain. Guaranteeing security and protocol conformity through its elegant combination of cryptographic assurances and game theoretic economic…
Protocol narrations are widely used in security as semi-formal notations to specify conversations between roles. We define a translation from a protocol narration to the sequences of operations to be performed by each role. Unlike previous…
Blockchain has received attention for its potential use in business. Bitcoin is powered by blockchain, and interest in it has surged in the past few years. It has many uses that need to be modeled. Modeling is used in many walks of life to…
In blockchains such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, users compete in a transaction fee auction to get their transactions confirmed in the next block. A line of recent works set forth the desiderata for a "dream" transaction fee mechanism (TFM),…
Permisionless decentralized ledgers ("blockchains") such as the one underlying the cryptocurrency Bitcoin allow anonymous participants to maintain the ledger, while avoiding control or "censorship" by any single entity. In contrast,…
Smart contracts provide the means to stipulate rules of interaction between mutually distrustful organizations. They encode contractual agreements on the basis of source code, which else need to be contractualized in natural language. While…
In recent years, cryptocurrencies have attracted growing attention from both private investors and institutions. Among them, Bitcoin stands out for its impressive volatility and widespread influence. This paper explores the predictability…
The emerging blockchain technology supports decentralized computing paradigm shift and is a rapidly approaching phenomenon. While blockchain is thought primarily as the basis of Bitcoin, its application has grown far beyond cryptocurrencies…
Blockchains are distributed data structures that are used to achieve consensus in systems for cryptocurrencies (like Bitcoin) or smart contracts (like Ethereum). Although blockchains gained a lot of popularity recently, there is no…
Smart contracts are the artifact of the blockchain that provide immutable and verifiable specifications of physical transactions. Solidity is a domain-specific programming language with the purpose of defining smart contracts. It aims at…
We design and validate new block propagation protocols for the peer-to-peer (P2P) network of the Bitcoin blockchain. Despite its strong protection for security and privacy, the current Bitcoin blockchain can only support a low number of…
BitVMX is a new design for a virtual CPU to optimistically execute arbitrary programs on Bitcoin based on a challenge response game introduced in BitVM. Similar to BitVM1 we create a general-purpose CPU to be verified in Bitcoin script. Our…