Blockchain Data Research Articles

Exploring Blockchain Data Analysis and Its Communications Architecture: Achievements, Challenges, and Future Directions: A Review Article

Blockchain technology is relatively young but has the potential to disrupt several industries. Since the emergence of Bitcoin, also known as Blockchain 1.0, there has been significant interest in this technology. The introduction of Ethereum, or Blockchain 2.0, has expanded the types of data that can be stored on blockchain networks. The increasing popularity of blockchain technology has given rise to new challenges, such as user privacy and illicit financial activities, but has also facilitated technical advancements. Blockchain technology utilizes cryptographic hashes of user input to record transactions. The public availability of blockchain data presents a unique opportunity for academics to analyze it and gain a better understanding of the challenges in blockchain communications. Researchers have never had access to such an opportunity before. Therefore, it is crucial to highlight the research problems, accomplishments, and potential trends and challenges in blockchain network data analysis and communications. This article aims to examine and summarize the field of blockchain data analysis and communications. The review encompasses the fundamental data types, analytical techniques, architecture, and operations related to blockchain networks. Seven research challenges are addressed: entity recognition, privacy, risk analysis, network visualization, network structure, market impact, and transaction pattern recognition. The latter half of this section discusses future research directions, opportunities, and challenges based on previous research limitations.

A New Scalable and Secure Access Control Scheme Using Blockchain Technology for IoT

The growth of IoT devices is so rapid that several billions of such devices would be in use in a span of four-year period. Essential security mechanisms need to be put in place to curb several security attacks prevalent in IoT. Access control is an important security mechanism that ensures legitimate and controlled access to critical and limited resources in IoT. The current access control schemes for IoT could not handle burgeoning number of IoT devices, while meeting the necessary level of security. Consequently, in this paper, we propose a new scalable and secure access control scheme for IoT. With blockchain as the root-of-trust, the proposed scheme performs access control for the IoT devices without having the resource-constrained IoT devices to be part of the blockchain network and to possess substantial amount of blockchain data. Blockchain’s tamper-proof property makes it an ideal candidate to be chosen as the root-of-trust. The scheme is secure against various security attacks prevalent in IoT. A proof-of-concept implementation for the scheme is developed and deployed in Ethereum Mainnet. The transaction costs of the different operations in the scheme are fairly below USD 3. Furthermore, scalability of the proposed scheme in different scenarios is investigated.

TCMQMS System: A digital twin and blockchain-based platform for tracing the whole process of Chinese medicine quality information

Traditional Chinese medicine is an important medicine and health food in China. In the process of making Chinese medicines, the main active ingredients of the medicines are highly dependent on the production environment due to the special physical characteristics of the medicines themselves. Any slight change in the environment can lead to changes in the active ingredients as well as the final efficacy, even affecting the patient treatment cycle, and this characteristic is not conducive to quality control by national drug quality regulators. In order to enhance the quality management of TCM, a blockchain and digital twin based whole process monitoring system for TCM quality is proposed: Traditional Chinese Medicine Quality Monitoring System (TCMQMS), in order to achieve a whole process, full scope and highly transparent TCM quality monitoring model for TCM production from the source of cultivation to the final patient. And. A blockchain platform based on Fabric blockchain data development platform as well as Sia distributed data storage was designed.
 With the help of Sia distributed storage technology, the amount of data storage is significantly compressed, which achieves the purpose of unifying the huge information data flow into the TCMQMS system and quickly building the system platform using the Fabric platform. In addition, in order to ensure that data is read and written in real time during the manufacturing and transportation of Chinese medicine, environmental sensors, such as temperature and humidity sensors, are placed in the Chinese medicine processing plant and in the transport sector. The environmental sensors, such as temperature and humidity sensors, are placed inside the Chinese medicine processing plants and transport vehicles. The environmental data is combined with the production data recorded by the TCMQMS system and sent to the digital twin TCM manufacturing simulation environment in real time, and through the simulation of the TCM manufacturing environment, the TCM quality environment parameters are continuously iteratively updated to be more suitable for production. This is coupled with real-time linkage with environmental sensors to achieve real-time adjustment of environmental parameters. In addition, the TCMQMS system records the entire process data, giving each data block a unique and tamper-proof hash value and CA certificate, so that when there is a possible quality problem, the hash value and CA certificate will be used to quickly trace the person responsible and the details of the environment in which the TCM was produced in real time. Finally, we present a real-life example of the use of the TCMQMS system to validate our proposed approach.

Blockchain-based quality management for a digital additive manufacturing part record

Quality management (QM) of additive manufacturing (AM) processes is currently immature in terms of transparency, traceability and security. In particular, quality-relevant documents are not documented and communicated in a traceable and transparent manner, which often leads to quality deficiencies. However, combining AM with blockchain technology can enable a solution that maps the AM value chain digitally, transparently, traceably and securely in a part record. In this work, a quality assurance (QA) concept for the metal-based material extrusion (MEX) process is developed that enables a digital representation of the value chain in the form of an AM part record. The decentralized solution presented in this work uses an architecture consisting of a web application for data acquisition, a decentralized storage solution for storing larger amounts of data, a smart contract for capturing manufacturing events and the Ethereum blockchain for transparent, secure and traceable storage of blockchain data. The AM part record enables traceable and constantly available digital documentation of quality information. The cost-effectiveness of the solution is also shown in a demonstration study. The research results highlight the benefits of a blockchain-based AM part record for digital manufacturing documentation and represent an efficient alternative or extension to existing QM and QA solutions in AM.

Retracted: Research on University Financial Accounting Management System Based on Big Data and Blockchain Data Fusion

Retracted: Research on University Financial Accounting Management System Based on Big Data and Blockchain Data Fusion

ChainDash: An Ad-Hoc Blockchain Data Analytics System

The emergence of digital asset applications, driven by Web 3.0 and powered by blockchain technology, has led to a growing demand for blockchain-specific graph analytics to unearth the insights. However, current blockchain data analytics systems are unable to perform efficient ad-hoc graph analytics over both live and past time windows due to their inefficient data synchronization and slow graph snapshots retrieval capability. To address these issues, we propose ChainDash, a blockchain data analytics system that dedicates a highly-parallelized data synchronization component and a retrieval-optimized temporal graph store. By leveraging these techniques, ChainDash supports efficient ad-hoc graph analytics of smart contract activities over arbitrary time windows. In the demonstration, we showcase the interactive visualization interfaces of ChainDash, where attendees will execute customized queries for ad-hoc graph analytics of blockchain data.

User authentication and access control to blockchain-based forensic log data

For dispute resolution in daily life, tamper-proof data storage and retrieval of log data are important with the incorporation of trustworthy access control for the related users and devices, while giving access to confidential data to the relevant users and maintaining data persistency are two major challenges in information security. This research uses blockchain data structure to maintain data persistency. On the other hand, we propose protocols for the authentication of users (persons and devices) to edge server and edge server to main server. Our proposed framework also provides access to forensic users according to their relevant roles and privilege attributes. For the access control of forensic users, a hybrid attribute and role-based access control (ARBAC) module added with the framework. The proposed framework is composed of an immutable blockchain-based data storage with endpoint authentication and attribute role-based user access control system. We simulate authentication protocols of the framework in AVISPA. Our result analysis shows that several security issues can efficiently be dealt with by the proposed framework.

Development and Implementation of Blockchain Solution to Enable Data Security at University of Port Harcourt

Institutions globally, seek for a solution that intelligently manages the security of data without tampering or mutilations. To compete globally, It has become necessary for the educational sector in Nigeria to build a software solution to end the challenges of fake results, transcripts and certificates and the time it takes to verify their authenticity. This research aims to develop and implement a blockchain solution that would enforce the required security for the Centre for Information and Telecommunication Engineering, University of Port Harcourt (CITE, Uniport), Nigeria. In this study the various services that comprise the building of a decentralized blockchain network, the network consensus algorithm and block explorer application as a unit was put together using JavaScript and its associate libraries. The blockchain data structure was developed with the ability of proof of work, the mining of new blocks, the creation of transactions, the validation of the chain, retrieving the data and other functionalities when demanded. The decentralized blockchain network was developed and tested for ten API (application programming interface) servers and the result shows that the blocks and transactions created were broadcasted throughout the entire network. The results of the consensus algorithms proved that it was able to verify and ensure that the network nodes have valid data and are synchronized. The blockchain explorer application was implemented with a lot of features. It allow user to query the blockchain for specific blocks, results, transcript or certificate.

Privacy Protection Data Retrieval Scheme With Inverted Index for IoT Based on Blockchain

In the 6G era, Internet of things (IoT) devices can form a blockchain network, which also faces the problems of data sharing. And the data transmitted and stored through the network has the risk of privacy leaking. Encrypting the shared data can satisfy the need of the privacy, and retrieving the encrypted data can make the data used efficiently.However, to enable users to retrieve encrypted data and perform fine-grained authorization on their encrypted files is still a great challenge. Although attribute-based keyword search (ABKS) is a well-received solution to the challenge, there are still privacy and efficiency issues if the traditional ABKS schemes are directly used in blockchain data sharing. In order to solve the problems, this paper proposes privacy protection data retrieval scheme with an inverted index which is an application of attribute-based encryption. Firstly, our scheme is proved secure against the outside keyword guessing attack (KGA) and chosen keyword attack (CKA) under semi-trusted model. Secondly, the scheme returns a multi-keywords ranked result. Thirdly, we analyze the efficiency of our scheme, and verify it by simulation.The results show that our scheme has improvement in efficiency and can meet the data sharing needs of the blockchain network composed of IoT devices.

Miner ID: Facilitating bitcoin as a service

Block production in Bitcoin, often referred to as mining, is becoming increasingly industrialized. Many nodes in the network are represented by registered business entities. The concept of Bitcoin as a Service is also pushing the industry to become more customer oriented. Services such as transaction validation, transaction status query or notification, and blockchain data indexing are in high demand among blockchain application providers and users. As service providers, nodes need to distinguish themselves from others and be identifiable. In this article, we introduce an efficient self-established identity system, called Miner ID, to enable nodes to be publicly identifiable. It is based on economic investment and active participation in the blockchain network. Moreover, Miner ID is optional for nodes, and it does not affect the consensus mechanism of the network. We explore use cases including instant transaction confirmation, blockchain attestation, public key infrastructure, and token recovery. Miner ID can also be used for secure communication with applications, services, users and peers.

A study on Diem and Aptos distributed ledger technology

ABSTRACT In the paper, Diem Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) and Aptos blockchain data are examined. First, the paper presents a general overview of the Diem project from a technical point of view. Second, it presents a study that aims to collect and analyze data from the Diem and Aptos blockchain, in order to verify some properties declared in the technical paper. For instance, a relevant property of the Diem and Aptos blockchains is their transactions' throughput, i.e. the rate at which valid transactions are committed into a block by the Diem blockchain in a one-second interval of time (transactions per second, TPS) and the interval of time for a transaction to be confirmed. In the case of the Diem blockchain, the data were collected over three months (January 1–March 31, 2022) while in the case of the Aptos blockchain, the data were collected over a month (December 1 - December 31, 2022). These data can be found on a GitHub repository that is publicly accessible. The results of the data analysis show that the average transactions' throughput is about 60 TPS and the waiting time is on average 1 minute and 40 seconds. Moreover, the paper sheds light on some Diem features that are unique when compared to similar blockchains, such as Ethereum. Some of these unique features are the consensus mechanism based on the BFT consensus protocols (Byzantine Fault Tolerance, 2017), its accounting system based on a hierarchical model and its programming language, Move, used to code smart contracts. Through this study, the capabilities of both Diem and Aptos blockchains will be explored in more depth.

Blockchain Data Analytics: A Review

Blockchain technology has emerged as a transformative force with widespread applications across various industries. In particular, the analysis of blockchain data has become crucial for crypto businesses and financial institutions seeking to protect transactions from illicit activities, minimize the risk of financial crimes, and ensure compliance with regulations. This paper presents a comprehensive review of blockchain data analytics, focusing on its significance in these domains. The paper examines the advancements and possibilities in blockchain data analytics, shedding light on their transformative potential. It provides an overview of the techniques and tools used for analyzing blockchain data, including transaction tracing, pattern recognition, and anomaly detection. Moreover, it explores the challenges and opportunities associated with blockchain data analytics, such as scalability, privacy concerns, and regulatory frameworks.

Research on hybrid teaching mode based on blockchain data sharing and artificial intelligence

Research on hybrid teaching mode based on blockchain data sharing and artificial intelligence

EAQ: Enabling Authenticated Complex Query Services in Sustainable-Storage Blockchain

The data query service is urgently required in sustainable-storage blockchain, where full nodes store the entire transaction data while light nodes only store block headers. Queries invariably seek data with multiple attributes. However, no existing method provides a unified authenticated data structure (ADS) to support complex query operators (e.g., range queries and data object queries) on multiattribute blockchain data. In this paper, we propose a framework EAQ that effectively supports both fast data queries on multiple attributes and authentication of the query result. We propose a new ADS, called the MR <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$^\mathit{Bloom}$</tex-math></inline-formula> -tree, based on the Bloom filter (BF) and Merkle R-tree. We prove the decomposability of BFs, which enables the BF to be seamlessly incorporated with the Merkle R-tree. This ADS enables range-level search using multidimensional attribute ranges and object-level search using BFs. This ADS also supports querying and proving inexistent data objects. To reduce storage overhead, we improve the MR <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"><tex-math notation="LaTeX">$^\mathit{Bloom}$</tex-math></inline-formula> -tree using the suppressed BF structure, which constructs only one BF independent of the number of attributes. To manage string attributes, we transform them into discrete numerical attributes using density-based clustering to represent similar items with close numerical values. Experiments show that the proposed framework achieves promising results.

A Decentralized and Automated Contracting System Using a Blockchain-Enabled Network of Stakeholders in Construction Megaprojects

With recent advances in information and communication technologies, trust and collaboration have become imperative in the construction industry. The increasing exchange of digital information and assets without much regard to contractual requirements has resulted in various data corruption, privacy, and security issues escalating to claims and disputes. Hence, there is a need to institute reforms in the existing contracting system to achieve a more efficient, collaborative, and transparent system. However, little research has investigated the digitalization of the contracting process, which continues to be traditional. This study is one of the first to develop a digital and automated contract management system leveraging blockchain technology and smart contracts. Design science research methodology was adopted for the research work. The proposed system aims to achieve the following: (1) a decentralized permissioned network of stakeholders with well-defined roles and approval workflow, (2) automated contract execution based on predefined conditions using smart contracts, and (3) transaction history integrity with time stamps via a blockchain-based secured data structure. To exemplify these points, a use case is presented for implementing blockchain-based contract management in a construction megaproject. A conceptual model was developed illustrating the decentralized network of the key project stakeholders based in a Hyperledger Fabric blockchain environment. The roles and access controls of the stakeholders within the network are defined using the responsibility assignment [responsible, accountable, consulted, and informed (RACI) matrix]. A computable and automated smart contract clause is formulated for the price variation clause used in construction contracts. A prototype of the proposed system was developed and demonstrated to industry experts for evaluation and validation. Positive feedback from the experts concerning the system characteristics and user-friendliness of the prototype showed that it possesses the potential to improve trust and transparency in the existing system. Whereas the decentralized stakeholder network would add trust and accountability to the system, the underlying blockchain data structure would enhance security and traceability by providing an immutable and real-time record of the transactions. The study provides a workable solution that serves as a valuable reference for future research in the field of contract management across multiple sectors. Although the system is shown to be applicable and feasible in this study, it may not be economically viable. It could be optimized in the future through cost–benefit analysis for different projects.

Monetary policy and Bitcoin

I empirically study the impact of monetary policy on Bitcoin, and show that is has evolved over time. First, based on high-frequency data, the paper documents that Bitcoin prices did not immediately respond to US monetary policy announcements in the past; they only started doing so in late 2020, in a manner similar to other risky asset prices. Second, based on a structural VAR analysis I study the impact of monetary policy over longer horizons. I confirm the contractionary impact of a US monetary tightening in the post-2020 time period, but show that, historically, a US tightening used to persistently increase rather than decrease Bitcoin prices. To explain this result, I exploit spreads in Bitcoin valuations across currencies and blockchain data and link increased Bitcoin demand to East Asian economies subject to capital controls, particularly China. I discuss implications for the discussion of where demand for Bitcoin stems from: its recent responses to monetary policy confirm its role as a primarily speculative asset; yet, at least historically Bitcoin seems to have derived part if its value from enabling cross-border value transfers and capital flight.

Towards a Unified Architecture Powering Scalable Learning Models with IoT Data Streams, Blockchain, and Open Data

The huge amount of data produced by the Internet of Things need to be validated and curated to be prepared for the selection of relevant data in order to prototype models, train them, and serve the model. On the other side, blockchains and open data are also important data sources that need to be integrated into the proposed integrative models. It is difficult to find a sufficiently versatile and agnostic architecture based on the main machine learning frameworks that facilitate model development and allow continuous training to continuously improve them from the data streams. The paper describes the conceptualization, implementation, and testing of a new architecture that proposes a use case agnostic processing chain. The proposed architecture is mainly built around the Apache Submarine, an unified Machine Learning platform that facilitates the training and deployment of algorithms. Here, Internet of Things data are collected and formatted at the edge level. They are then processed and validated at the fog level. On the other hand, open data and blockchain data via Blockchain Access Layer are directly processed at the cloud level. Finally, the data are preprocessed to feed scalable machine learning algorithms.

Research on Blockchain Data Availability and Storage Scalability

Blockchain adopts a chain data structure, and the characteristics of blocks that can only be added and cannot be deleted make the total number of blocks accumulate over time, forcing resource-constrained nodes to become degraded nodes in order to alleviate increasingly severe storage pressure. Degraded nodes only store partial blocks, although improving the scalability of blockchain storage and reducing data redundancy will lead to a decrease in data availability. To address the problem of storage scalability, quantitative research is needed on data availability. Based on a summary of the existing definitions of data availability, we propose a definition of data availability for blockchain. By analyzing the data synchronization process and the transaction lifecycle, key factors affecting data availability were extracted, and a data availability measurement model was constructed based on node types. On this basis, a relationship model linking data availability and storage scalability was constructed to find the range of data redundancy that meets the target data availability. The experimental results indicate that the data availability measurement model for blockchain can measure the data availability levels of different scalable storage schemes. The model of the relationship between data availability and storage scalability can guide the setting of data redundancy in scalable storage schemes.

Segmented sensor blockchain based on state and block compression

In the sensor blockchain network, sensors need to collect data continuously and upload it to the blockchain network for verification of data integrity. The deployment of smart contracts on the chain can be used to authenticate data visitors. Historical data is valuable for data visitors, but it is useless for sensor nodes that can continue to link data only with current information. With the passage of time, the data of the sensor blockchain network will continue to grow. A node data storage mode that can adapt to the continuous expansion of the blockchain scale is needed, which can encourage nodes to join the network to participate in consensus and jointly maintain the security of the blockchain data. This paper provides a segmented storage solution based on state and block compression for sensor device nodes with limited storage capacity. After experimental verification, this scheme can significantly reduce the storage cost. It allows nodes to use blockchain for a long time in sensor blockchain networks with large transaction volumes and a large number of smart contracts and allows new nodes to be deployed faster.

Logistics dynamic information retrieval based on blockchain data security model

This study presents blockchain technology to integrate the time attribute of Internet of Things data and the time stamp of blockchain, and proposes a data retrieval solution based on dynamic information retrieval. Analyze and reorganize the blockchain data at the bottom of the logistics information platform to synchronize the logistics information to the third-party relational database. The experimental results show that the proposed method can improve the data entry time of the system by 5.2%, and the system occupancy rate is less than 4.1%. It is proved that the proposed model can simplify the data attributes of the Internet of Things, improve the universality of data, effectively integrate the structural characteristics of the Internet of Things and blockchain, and realize safe and efficient data management and application.