Related papers: A Jumping Mining Attack and Solution
In this paper, we review the undercutting attacks in the transaction-fee-based regime of proof-of-work (PoW) blockchains with the longest chain fork-choice rule. Next, we focus on the problem of fluctuations in mining revenue and the mining…
This paper opts to mitigate the energy-inefficiency of the Blockchain Proof-of-Work (PoW) consensus algorithm by rationally repurposing the power spent during the mining process. The original PoW mining scheme is designed to consider one…
The blockchain system has emerged as one of the focal points of research in recent years, particularly in applications and services such as cryptocurrencies and smart contracts. In this context, the hash value serves as a crucial element in…
We calculate the probability of success of block-hiding mining strategies in Bitcoin-like networks. These strategies involve building a secret branch of the block-tree and publishing it opportunistically, aiming to replace the top of the…
It has been known for some time that the Nakamoto consensus as implemented in the Bitcoin protocol is not totally aligned with the individual interests of the participants. More precisely, it has been shown that block withholding mining…
We analyze the economic incentives generated by the proof-of-stake mechanism discussed in the Ethereum Casper upgrade proposal. Compared with proof-of-work, proof-of-stake has a different cost structure for attackers. In Budish (2018),…
Blockchain uses the idea of storing transaction data in the form of a distributed ledger wherein each node in the network stores a current copy of the sequence of transactions in the form of a hash chain. This requirement of storing the…
Incentive mechanisms are central to the functionality of permissionless blockchains: they incentivize participants to run and secure the underlying consensus protocol. Designing incentive-compatible incentive mechanisms is notoriously…
Bitcoin is a representative decentralized currency system. For the security of Bitcoin, fairness in the distribution of mining rewards plays a crucial role in preventing the concentration of computational power in a few miners. Here,…
Mining is the foundation of blockchain-based cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin rewarding the miner for finding blocks for new transactions. The Monero currency enables mining with standard hardware in contrast to special hardware (ASICs) as…
This paper studies to what extent the cost of operating a proof-of-work blockchain is intrinsically linked to the cost of preventing attacks, and to what extent the underlying digital ledger security budgets are correlated with the…
Proof-of-Work (PoW) is a popular blockchain consensus algorithm that is used in cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin in which hashing operations are repeated until the resulting hash has certain properties. This approach uses lots of computational…
Payment channel networks are an approach to improve the scalability of blockchain-based cryptocurrencies. The Lightning Network is a payment channel network built for Bitcoin that is already used in practice. Because the Lightning Network…
Bitcoin's Proof of Work (PoW) mechanism, while central to achieving decentralized consensus, has long been criticized for excessive energy use and hardware inefficiencies \cite{devries2018bitcoin, truby2018decarbonizing}. This paper…
Blockchains face a scalability limitation, partly due to the throughput limitations of consensus protocols, especially when aiming to obtain a high degree of decentralization. Layer 2 Rollups (L2s) are a faster alternative to conventional…
In this paper, we explore vulnerabilities and countermeasures of the recently proposed blockchain consensus based on proof-of-authority. The proof-of-work blockchains, like Bitcoin and Ethereum, have been shown both theoretically and…
Proof-of-work (PoW) cryptocurrencies rely on a balance of security and fairness in order to maintain a sustainable ecosystem of miners and users. Users demand fast and consistent transaction confirmation, and in exchange drive the adoption…
Currently, miners typically join mining pools to solve cryptographic puzzles together, and mining pools are in high competition. This has led to the development of several attack strategies such as block withholding (BWH) and fork after…
Bitcoin is a popular cryptocurrency that records alltransactions in a distributed append-only public ledger calledblockchain. The security of Bitcoin heavily relies on the incentive-compatible proof-of-work (PoW) based distributed consensus…
Open-access blockchains based on proof-of-work protocols have gained tremendous popularity for their capabilities of providing decentralized tamper-proof ledgers and platforms for data-driven autonomous organization. Nevertheless, the…