On-chain is not enough: Ensuring pre-data on the chain credibility for blockchain-based source-tracing systems

Abstract

The blockchain provides a reliable and scalable method for enabling source-tracing functionality in large-scale Internet of Things (IoT) systems. Traditional blockchain-based source tracing applications are generally based on the hypothesis that the raw data collected by each IoT node are credible and consistent, which however may not always be the truth. As no mechanism ensures the reliability of the original data collected from the IoT devices, these data may be accidently screwed up or maliciously tampered with before they are uploaded on-chain. To address this issue, we propose the Multi-dimensional Certificates of Origin (MCO) method to filter out the potentially incredible data-till all the data uploaded to the chain are credible. To achieve this, we devise the Multi-dimensional Information Cross-Verification (MICV) and Multi-source Data Matching Calculation (MDMC) methods. MICV verifies whether a to-be-uploaded datum is consistent or credible, and MDMC determines which data should be discarded and which data should be kept to retain the most likely credible/untampered ones in the circumstance when data inconsistency appears. Large-scale experiments show that our scheme ensures on the credibility of data and off the chain with an affordable overhead.