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Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications

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Special Issue Information
Published Papers

A special issue of Sensors (ISSN 1424-8220). This special issue belongs to the section "Communications".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (15 December 2022) | Viewed by 26660

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Special Issue Editors

Dr. Kashif Kashif

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, China
Interests: communication and protocol evaluation; blockchain technologies; information-centric networking; Internet of things; software-defined networking; 5G/6G systems; simulation for mobile and wireless ad hoc/sensor networks

Dr. Madiha Shahzad

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor

KIOS Research and Innovation Center of Excellence, University of Cyprus, Nicosia, Cyprus
Interests: Computer networks; heterogeneous mobile networks; 5G VANETS; ubiquities computing

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Blockchain technology (BCT) and distributed ledger technologies (DLT) have recently emerged as solutions that can provide unparalleled security features to several types of systems. They have primarily been used for crypto currency, but can also be applied to other domains such as IoT, IIoT, asset tracking, access control, and business processes. Moreover, their properties of encryption support, the immutability of the ledger, user anonymization, and validation through multi-peer consensus can be extremely beneficial for numerous types of application scenarios.

This Special Issue aims to collect high-quality research in the domains of blockchain and distributed ledger technologies for future internet communication, intelligent blockchain solutions, consumer-level applications, security and privacy issues, and prototyping. We encourage original and high‐quality submissions related to one or more of the following topics, including, but not limited to:

Blockchain and DLT solutions for IoT and industrial IoT devices;
Blockchain-as-a-service for consumer applications;
Novel architecture for AI-based consensus algorithms and communication protocols;
Blockchain integrated with 5G and 6G communication;
Energy and computational efficiency of blockchain-based systems;
Security and privacy issues with solutions for blockchain and distributed ledgers;
Scaleable blockchains using virtualization and softwarization technologies;
Decentralized and collaborative blockchain solutions for inter-system interoperability;
Blockchains for future internet models: prototypes and test beds.

Blockchain and distributed ledger technologies are emerging and heavily rely on hardware systems. Integrating IoT and sensor devices at the hardware level to BS systems is an important challenge. Furthermore, the integration of different standards and technologies in such platforms will be a major research direction in the near future

Dr. Kashif Kashif
Dr. Madiha Shahzad
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

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Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Published Papers (7 papers)

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Research

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27 pages, 1201 KiB

Open AccessArticle

A Taxonomic Hierarchy of Blockchain Consensus Algorithms: An Evolutionary Phylogeny Approach

by Heesang Kim and Dohoon Kim

Sensors 2023, 23(5), 2739; https://doi.org/10.3390/s23052739 - 02 Mar 2023

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2023

Abstract

Countless endeavors have been undertaken to address the Byzantine Generals Problem, a generalization of the Two Generals Problem. The emergence of proof of work (PoW) for Bitcoin has led to various consensus algorithms diverging, and comparable existing consensus algorithms are being gradually utilized interchangeably, or only developed for each specific application domain. Our approach employs an evolutionary phylogeny method to classify blockchain consensus algorithms based on their historical development and current usage. To demonstrate the relatedness and lineage of distinct algorithms, as well as to support the recapitulation theory, which posits that the evolutionary history of its mainnets is mirrored in the development of an individual consensus algorithm, we present a taxonomy. We have created a comprehensive classification of past and present consensus algorithms that serves to organize this swift consensus algorithm evolution period. By recognizing similarities, we have compiled a list of different verified consensus algorithms and performed clustering on over 38 of these. Our new taxonomic tree presents five taxonomic ranks, including the evolutionary process and decision-making method, as a technique for analyzing correlation. Through the examination of the evolution and utilization of these algorithms, we have developed a systematic and hierarchical taxonomy that enables the grouping of consensus algorithms into distinct categories. The proposed method classifies various consensus algorithms according to taxonomic ranks and aims to reveal the direction of research on the application of blockchain consensus algorithms for each domain. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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17 pages, 844 KiB

Open AccessArticle

CCIO: A Cross-Chain Interoperability Approach for Consortium Blockchains Based on Oracle

by Shaofei Lu, Jingru Pei, Renke Zhao, Xiaochen Yu, Xuyang Zhang, Junyi Li and Guanzhong Yang

Sensors 2023, 23(4), 1864; https://doi.org/10.3390/s23041864 - 07 Feb 2023

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2557

Abstract

Cross-chain interoperability can expand the ability of data interaction and value circulation between different blockchains, especially the value interaction and information sharing between industry consortium blockchains. However, some current public blockchain cross-chain technologies or data migration schemes between consortium blockchains need help to meet the consortium blockchain requirements for efficient two-way data interaction. The critical issue to solve in cross-chain technology is improving the efficiency of cross-chain exchange while ensuring the security of data transmission outside the consortium blockchain. In this article, we design a cross-chain architecture based on blockchain oracle technology. Then, we propose a bidirectional information cross-chain interaction approach (CCIO) based on the former architecture, we novelly improve three traditional blockchain oracle patterns, and we combine a mixture of symmetric and asymmetric keys to encrypt private information to ensure cross-chain data security. The experimental results demonstrate that the proposed CCIO approach can achieve efficient and secure two-way cross-chain data interactions and better meet the application needs of large-scale consortium blockchains. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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23 pages, 514 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Continuous and Secure Integration Framework for Smart Contracts

by Alvaro Reyes, Miguel Jimeno and Ricardo Villanueva-Polanco

Sensors 2023, 23(1), 541; https://doi.org/10.3390/s23010541 - 03 Jan 2023

Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2522

Abstract

As part of agile methodologies seen in the past few years, IT organizations have continuously adopted new practices in their software delivery life-cycle to improve both efficiency and effectiveness of development teams. Two of these practices are continuous integration and continuous deployment, which are part of the DevOps cycle which has helped organizations build software effectively and efficiently. These practices must be considered for new technologies such as smart contracts, where security concerns and bugs might cost more once deployed than traditional software. This paper states the importance of using a proper DevOps routine and how it is possible to apply this practice to a smart contract build. Specifically, this paper introduces a framework to implement DevOps for smart contracts development by describing multiple DevOps tools and their applicability to smart contract development. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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17 pages, 4236 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Implementation of a Distributed Framework for Permissioned Blockchain-Based Secure Automotive Supply Chain Management

by Saima Zafar, Syed Faseeh Ul Hassan, AlSharef Mohammad, Ahmad Aziz Al-Ahmadi and Nasim Ullah

Sensors 2022, 22(19), 7367; https://doi.org/10.3390/s22197367 - 28 Sep 2022

Cited by 7 | Viewed by 2547

Abstract

An automotive supply chain includes a range of activities from the concept of the product to its final transfer to a customer and subsequent vehicle maintenance. The three distinct stages of this chain are production, sales, and maintenance. In many countries, automobile records are not available to the public and anyone who has access to the central database or government systems can tamper with these records. In addition, used vehicle maintenance and transfer histories remain unavailable or inaccessible. These issues can be overcome by incorporating state-of-the-art blockchain technology into automotive supply chain management. Blockchain technology uses a chain of blocks for distributed transfer and storage of information, creating a decentralized data register that makes records of any digital asset tamper-proof and transparent. In this paper, we implement a permissioned blockchain-based framework for secure and efficient supply chain management of the automobile industry. We employed Hyperledger Fabric; an enterprise-grade distributed ledger platform for developing solutions. In our solution, the blockchain is customized and private in order to ensure system security. We evaluated our system in terms of memory cost, monetary cost, and speed of execution. Our results demonstrate that only 346 MB of extra memory space is required for storing the automotive data of 1 million users, thus rendering the memory cost negligible. The monetary cost is insignificant as all open source blockchain resources are employed, and the speed of record update is also fast. Our results also show that the decentralization of the automotive supply chain using blockchain can implement system security with minor modifications in the established configuration of the web application database. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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23 pages, 5408 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Improving Agricultural Product Traceability Using Blockchain

by Qi Yao and Huajun Zhang

Sensors 2022, 22(9), 3388; https://doi.org/10.3390/s22093388 - 28 Apr 2022

Cited by 20 | Viewed by 4029

Abstract

Most traditional agricultural traceability systems are centralized, which could result in the low reliability of traceability results, enterprise privacy data leakage vulnerabilities, and the generation of information islands. To solve the above problems, we propose a trusted agricultural product traceability system based on the Ethereum blockchain in this paper. We designed a dual storage model of “Blockchain+IPFS (InterPlanetary File System)” to reduce the storage pressure of the blockchain and realize efficient information queries. Additionally, we propose a data privacy protection solution based on some cryptographic primitives and the Merkle Tree that can avoid enterprise privacy and sensitive data leakage. Furthermore, we implemented the proposed system using the Ethereum blockchain platform and provided the cost, performance, and security analysis, as well as compared it with the existing solutions. The results showed that the proposed system is both efficient and feasible and can meet the practical application requirements. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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Review

Jump to: Research, Other

43 pages, 4893 KiB

Open AccessReview

A Systematic Literature Review and Meta-Analysis on Scalable Blockchain-Based Electronic Voting Systems

by Uzma Jafar, Mohd Juzaiddin Ab Aziz, Zarina Shukur and Hafiz Adnan Hussain

Sensors 2022, 22(19), 7585; https://doi.org/10.3390/s22197585 - 06 Oct 2022

Cited by 9 | Viewed by 8089

Abstract

Electronic voting systems must find solutions to various issues with authentication, data privacy and integrity, transparency, and verifiability. On the other hand, Blockchain technology offers an innovative solution to many of these problems. The scalability of Blockchain has arisen as a fundamental barrier to realizing the promise of this technology, especially in electronic voting. This study seeks to highlight the solutions regarding scalable Blockchain-based electronic voting systems and the issues linked with them while also attempting to foresee future developments. A systematic literature review (SLR) was used to complete the task, leading to the selection of 76 articles in the English language from 1 January 2017 to 31 March 2022 from the famous databases. This SLR was conducted to identify well-known proposals, their implementations, verification methods, various cryptographic solutions in previous research to evaluate cost and time. It also identifies performance parameters, the primary advantages and obstacles presented by different systems, and the most common approaches for Blockchain scalability. In addition, it outlines several possible research avenues for developing a scalable electronic voting system based on Blockchain technology. This research helps future research before proposing or developing any solutions to keep in mind all the voting requirements, merits, and demerits of the proposed solutions and provides further guidelines for scalable voting solutions. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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Other

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12 pages, 3638 KiB

Open AccessTechnical Note

Blockchain Private File Storage-Sharing Method Based on IPFS

by Peng Kang, Wenzhong Yang and Jiong Zheng

Sensors 2022, 22(14), 5100; https://doi.org/10.3390/s22145100 - 07 Jul 2022

Cited by 20 | Viewed by 3902

Abstract

Under the current national network environment, anyone can participate in publishing. As an important information resource, knowledge files reflect the workload of publishers. Moreover, high-quality knowledge files can promote the progress of society. However, pirated inferior files have the opposite effect. At present, most organizations use centralized servers to centrally manage the knowledge files released by users. In addition, it is necessary to introduce an untrusted third party to examine and encrypt the contents of files, which leads to an opaque process of file storage transactions, tampering with intellectual copyright, and the inability to have consistent systems of file management among institutions due to the lack of uniform standards for the same intellectual files. The purpose of this paper is to ensure the safe storage of knowledge files on the one hand and to realize efficient sharing of copyrighted files on the other hand. Therefore, this paper combines NDN (Named Data Network) technology with a distributed blockchain and an Interplanetary File System (IPFS) and proposes a blockchain knowledge file storage and sharing method based on an NDN. The method uses the NDN itself for the file content signature and encryption, thereby separating the file security and transmission process. At the same time, the method uses a flexible NDN reverse path forwarding and routing strategy, combining an IPFS private storage network to improve the safety of the encrypted data storage security. Finally, the method takes advantage of all participating nodes consensus and shares files in the synchronized blockchain to ensure traceability. This paper introduces the structure and principles of the method and describes the process of file upload and transfer. Finally, the performance of the method is compared and evaluated, and the advantages and disadvantages of the method and the future research direction are summarized. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technology for Future Internet Models: Technologies, Trends, and Applications)

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