English
Related papers

Related papers: Attack-Centric by Design: A Program-Structure Taxo…

200 papers

Smart contracts are appealing because they are self-executing business agreements between parties with the predefined and immutable obligations and rights. However, as with all software, smart contracts may contain vulnerabilities because…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2019-12-10 Weifeng Xu , Glenn A. Fink

With the increasing popularity of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology, smart contracts have become a prominent feature in developing decentralized applications. However, these smart contracts are susceptible to vulnerabilities that…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2023-08-22 Jiachi Chen , Mingyuan Huang , Zewei Lin , Peilin Zheng , Zibin Zheng

Smart contract vulnerabilities have led to billions in losses, yet finding actionable exploits remains challenging. Traditional fuzzers rely on rigid heuristics and struggle with complex attacks, while human auditors are thorough but slow…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-01-13 Arthur Gervais , Liyi Zhou

Smart contracts written in Solidity are programs used in blockchain networks, such as Etherium, for performing transactions. However, as with any piece of software, they are prone to errors and may present vulnerabilities, which malicious…

Logic in Computer Science · Computer Science 2021-11-29 Kunjian Song , Nedas Matulevicius , Eddie B. de Lima Filho , Lucas C. Cordeiro

Front-running attacks have been a major concern on the blockchain. Attackers launch front-running attacks by inserting additional transactions before upcoming victim transactions to manipulate victim transaction executions and make profits.…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2023-05-04 Wuqi Zhang , Lili Wei , Shing-Chi Cheung , Yepang Liu , Shuqing Li , Lu Liu , Michael R. Lyu

Solidity smart contracts are programs that manage up to 2^160 users on a blockchain. Verifying a smart contract relative to all users is intractable due to state explosion. Existing solutions either restrict the number of users to…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2021-09-02 Scott Wesley , Maria Christakis , Jorge A. Navas , Richard Trefler , Valentin Wüstholz , Arie Gurfinkel

Smart contracts are essential to decentralized finance (DeFi) and blockchain ecosystems but are increasingly vulnerable to exploits due to coding errors and complex attack vectors. Traditional static analysis tools and existing…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2025-02-20 Jun Kevin , Pujianto Yugopuspito

Smart contracts with external data are crucial for functionality but pose security and reliability concerns. Statistical and quantitative studies on this interaction are scarce. To address this gap, we analyzed 10,500 smart contracts,…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-02-10 Yishun Wang , Xiaoqi Li , Shipeng Ye , Lei Xie , Ju Xing

With a market capitalisation of over USD 205 billion in just under ten years, public distributed ledgers have experienced significant adoption. Apart from novel consensus mechanisms, their success is also accountable to smart contracts.…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2018-11-02 Dominik Harz , William Knottenbelt

Cyber-attacks can have severe impacts on critical infrastructures, from outages to economical loss and physical damage to people and environment. One of the main targets of these attacks is the smart grid. In this paper, we propose a new…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2022-09-20 José Ignacio Requeno

Smart Contracts (SCs) handle transactions in the Ethereum blockchain worth millions of United States dollars, making them a lucrative target for attackers seeking to exploit vulnerabilities and steal funds. The Ethereum community has…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2024-12-16 Chavhan Sujeet Yashavant , MitrajSinh Chavda , Saurabh Kumar , Amey Karkare , Angshuman Karmakar

Smart contract transactions are increasingly interleaved by cross-contract calls. While many tools have been developed to identify a common set of vulnerabilities, the cross-contract vulnerability is overlooked by existing tools.…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2022-07-01 Yinxing Xue , Jiaming Ye , Wei Zhang , Jun Sun , Lei Ma , Haijun Wang , Jianjun Zhao

Software applications are subject to an increasing number of attacks, resulting in data breaches and financial damage. Many solutions have been considered to help mitigate these attacks, such as the integration of attack-awareness…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2020-07-20 Tolga Ünlü , Lynsay A. Shepherd , Natalie Coull , Colin McLean

Large Language Models (LLMs) are being used more and more for various coding tasks, including to help coders identify bugs and are a promising avenue to support coders in various tasks including vulnerability detection -- particularly given…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2025-05-27 Ignacio Mariano Andreozzi Pofcher , Joshua Ellul

Smart contracts are programs running on a blockchain. They are immutable to change, and hence can not be patched for bugs once deployed. Thus it is critical to ensure they are bug-free and well-designed before deployment. A Contract defect…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2020-04-20 Jiachi Chen , Xin Xia , David Lo , John Grundy , Daniel Xiapu Luo , Ting Chen

Decentralized Finance (DeFi) is emerging as a peer-to-peer financial ecosystem, enabling participants to trade products on a permissionless blockchain. Built on blockchain and smart contracts, the DeFi ecosystem has experienced explosive…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2023-09-07 Peng Qian , Rui Cao , Zhenguang Liu , Wenqing Li , Ming Li , Lun Zhang , Yufeng Xu , Jianhai Chen , Qinming He

As the Ethereum platform continues to mature and gain widespread usage, it is crucial to maintain high standards of smart contract writing practices. While bad practices in smart contracts may not directly lead to security issues, they…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-02-03 Xiaoqi Li , Zongwei Li , Wenkai Li , Yuqing Zhang , Xin Wang

Smart contracts underpin high-value ecosystems such as decentralized finance (DeFi), yet recurring vulnerabilities continue to cause losses worth billions of dollars. Although numerous security analyzers that detect such flaws exist,…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2026-03-03 Tamer Abdelaziz , Salma Alsaghir , Karim Ali

A thorough and systematic understanding of different elements of cyberattacks is essential for developing the necessary tools to prevent, detect, diagnose, and mitigate cyberattacks in manufacturing systems. In response, researchers have…

Cryptography and Security · Computer Science 2023-03-23 Md Habibor Rahman , Thorsten Wuest , Mohammed Shafae

Developers of smart contracts pervasively reuse subcontracts to improve development efficiency. Like any program language, such subcontract reuse may unexpectedly include, or introduce vulnerabilities to the end-point smart contract.…

Software Engineering · Computer Science 2025-09-30 Zeqin Liao , Yuhong Nan , Zixu Gao , Henglong Liang , Sicheng Hao , Jiajing Wu , Zibin Zheng