Abstract
In recent times, Bitcoin has gained special attention both from industry and academia. The underlying technology that enables Bitcoin (or more generally crypto-currency) is called blockchain. At the core of the blockchain technology is a data structure that keeps record of the transactions in the network. The special feature that distinguishes it from existing technology is its immutability of the stored records. To achieve immutability, it uses consensus and cryptographic mechanisms. As the data is stored in distributed nodes this technology is also termed as 'Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT)'. As many researchers and practitioners are joining the hype of blockchain, some of them are raising the question about the fundamental difference between blockchain and traditional database and its real value or potential. In this paper, we present a critical analysis of both technologies based on a survey of the research literature where blockchain solutions are applied to various scenarios. Based on this analysis, we further develop a decision tree diagram that will help both practitioners and researchers to choose the appropriate technology for their use cases. Using our proposed decision tree we evaluate a sample of the existing works to see to what extent the blockchain solutions have been used appropriately in the relevant problem domains.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Proceedings of the 17th IEEE International Conference on trust, security and privacy in computing and communications ((IEEE TrustCom 2018) and 12th IEEE International Conference on big data science and engineering (IEEE BigDataSE 2018) |
| Subtitle of host publication | Trustcom/BigDataSE 2018 |
| Publisher | IEEE, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers |
| Pages | 1348-1353 |
| Number of pages | 6 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 978153843884 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781538643891 (Print of demand) |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 05 Sept 2018 |
| Event | The 17th IEEE International Conference On Trust, Security And Privacy In Computing And Communications (IEEE TrustCom-18) - Hilton Newark Airport, New York, United States Duration: 31 Jul 2018 → 03 Aug 2018 https://web.archive.org/web/20180827022431/http://www.cloud-conf.net/trustcom18/index.html (Conference website) |
Conference
| Conference | The 17th IEEE International Conference On Trust, Security And Privacy In Computing And Communications (IEEE TrustCom-18) |
|---|---|
| Country/Territory | United States |
| City | New York |
| Period | 31/07/18 → 03/08/18 |
| Other | The 17th IEEE International Conference on Trust, Security and Privacy in Computing and Communications (IEEE TrustCom-18) will be held in New York, USA from August 1st to 3rd, 2018. The conference aims at bringing together researchers and practitioners in the world working on trusted computing and communications, with regard to trust, security, privacy, reliability, dependability, survivability, availability, and fault tolerance aspects of computer systems and networks, and providing a forum to present and discuss emerging ideas and trends in this highly challenging research field. |
| Internet address |