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Future Internet
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Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends
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Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends

A special issue of Future Internet (ISSN 1999-5903). This special issue belongs to the section "Internet of Things".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 January 2024) | Viewed by 23103

Special Issue Editor

Prof. Dr. Qiang Qu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Shenzhen Institute of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen 518055, China
Interests: data intensive systems; blockchain; Web 3.0
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Blockchain technology has emerged as a groundbreaking innovation, revolutionizing various industries by enabling secure, transparent, and decentralized systems. Blockchain's potential extends beyond finance to areas like supply chain management, healthcare, voting systems, and more. However, blockchain faces challenges related to scalability, as it must handle large volumes of transactions efficiently. Privacy is another concern, as the public nature of blockchain can expose sensitive information. Web 3.0 leverages blockchain and other decentralized technologies to create peer-to-peer networks, enabling direct interactions and eliminating the reliance on centralized entities. Despite its immense potential, Web 3.0 faces challenges in terms of usability, interoperability among different platforms, and the development of user-friendly decentralized applications (dApps). Scalability and performance limitations also need to be addressed to provide a seamless user experience.

As blockchain and Web 3.0 continue to evolve, addressing these challenges becomes crucial to unlocking their full potential. Research and innovation in these areas are essential to overcome scalability hurdles, enhance privacy mechanisms, establish application frameworks, and develop user-friendly solutions. By doing so, blockchain and Web 3.0 can realize their promise of transforming industries, empowering individuals, and shaping the future of the digital landscape.

The purpose of this Special Issue is to solicit original and unpublished papers that contribute theoretical and practical proposals in various research areas of blockchain and Web 3.0. The primary focus is on exploring applications and addressing associated challenges. Authors are encouraged to submit articles that identify existing problems and challenges while providing suggestions for their resolution. Moreover, contributions discussing the revolutionary prospects of blockchain and Web 3.0 technology, as well as their real-life applications and implications, are highly welcomed. This Special Issue welcomes review articles, survey papers, and technical papers. While the following topic areas are highlighted, submissions covering other related subjects are also encouraged:

  • Blockchain theories and their evolution;
  • Smart contracts techniques and solutions;
  • Distributed consensus and network design in various applications;
  • Issues of security and privacy surrounding blockchain and Web 3.0 technology;
  • Performance optimization of blockchain systems;
  • Integration of blockchain with other emerging technologies;
  • Cryptocurrency theories, methods and applications;
  • Transaction mining and analysis;
  • Economics and game theoretic analysis of cryptocurrency protocols;
  • Usability and user studies;
  • Case studies (e.g., of adoption, attacks, forks, scams, etc.).

Prof. Dr. Qiang Qu
Guest Editor

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.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Future Internet is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 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.

Keywords

  • blockchain
  • smart contract
  • cryptocurrency
  • security and privacy
  • distributed consensus and networks
  • transaction analysis

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Related Special Issue

Published Papers (8 papers)

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Research

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18 pages, 2302 KiB  
Article
Blockchain-Enabled Secure and Interoperable Authentication Scheme for Metaverse Environments
by Sonali Patwe and Sunil B. Mane
Future Internet 2024, 16(5), 166; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi16050166 - 11 May 2024
Viewed by 1390
Abstract
The metaverse, which amalgamates physical and virtual realms for diverse social activities, has been the focus of extensive application development by organizations, research institutes, and companies. However, these applications are often isolated, employing distinct authentication methods across platforms. Achieving interoperable authentication is crucial [...] Read more.
The metaverse, which amalgamates physical and virtual realms for diverse social activities, has been the focus of extensive application development by organizations, research institutes, and companies. However, these applications are often isolated, employing distinct authentication methods across platforms. Achieving interoperable authentication is crucial for when avatars traverse different metaverses to mitigate security concerns like impersonation, mutual authentication, replay, and server spoofing. To address these issues, we propose a blockchain-enabled secure and interoperable authentication scheme. This mechanism uniquely identifies users in the physical world as well as avatars, facilitating seamless navigation across verses. Our proposal is substantiated through informal security analyses, employing automated verification of internet security protocols and applications (AVISPA), the real-or-random (ROR) model, and Burrows–Abadi–Needham (BAN) logic and showcasing effectiveness against a broad spectrum of security threats. Comparative assessments against similar schemes demonstrate our solution’s superiority in terms of communication costs, computation costs, and security features. Consequently, our blockchain-enabled, interoperable, and secure authentication scheme stands as a robust solution for ensuring security in metaverse environments. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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20 pages, 3027 KiB  
Article
Blockchain-Enabled Provenance Tracking for Sustainable Material Reuse in Construction Supply Chains
by Stanly Wilson, Kwabena Adu-Duodu, Yinhao Li, Ringo Sham, Mohammed Almubarak, Yingli Wang, Ellis Solaiman, Charith Perera, Rajiv Ranjan and Omer Rana
Future Internet 2024, 16(4), 135; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi16040135 - 17 Apr 2024
Viewed by 1877
Abstract
The growing complexity of construction supply chains and the significant impact of the construction industry on the environment demand an understanding of how to reuse and repurpose materials. In response to this critical challenge, research gaps that are significant in promoting material circularity [...] Read more.
The growing complexity of construction supply chains and the significant impact of the construction industry on the environment demand an understanding of how to reuse and repurpose materials. In response to this critical challenge, research gaps that are significant in promoting material circularity are described. Despite its potential, the use of blockchain technology in construction faces challenges in verifiability, scalability, privacy, and interoperability. We propose a novel multilayer blockchain framework to enhance provenance tracking and data retrieval to enable a reliable audit trail. The framework utilises a privacy-centric solution that combines decentralised and centralised storage, security, and privacy. Furthermore, the framework implements access control to strengthen security and privacy, fostering transparency and information sharing among the stakeholders. These contributions collectively lead to trusted material circularity in a built environment. The implementation framework aims to create a prototype for blockchain applications in construction supply chains. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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13 pages, 395 KiB  
Article
Efficient and Secure Distributed Data Storage and Retrieval Using Interplanetary File System and Blockchain
by Muhammad Bin Saif, Sara Migliorini and Fausto Spoto
Future Internet 2024, 16(3), 98; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi16030098 - 15 Mar 2024
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 2836
Abstract
Blockchain technology has been successfully applied in recent years to promote the immutability, traceability, and authenticity of previously collected and stored data. However, the amount of data stored in the blockchain is usually limited for economic and technological issues. Namely, the blockchain usually [...] Read more.
Blockchain technology has been successfully applied in recent years to promote the immutability, traceability, and authenticity of previously collected and stored data. However, the amount of data stored in the blockchain is usually limited for economic and technological issues. Namely, the blockchain usually stores only a fingerprint of data, such as the hash of data, while full, raw information is stored off-chain. This is generally enough to guarantee immutability and traceability, but misses to support another important property, that is, data availability. This is particularly true when a traditional, centralized database is chosen for off-chain storage. For this reason, many proposals try to properly combine blockchain with decentralized IPFS storage. However, the storage of data on IPFS could pose some privacy problems. This paper proposes a solution that properly combines blockchain, IPFS, and encryption techniques to guarantee immutability, traceability, availability, and data privacy. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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20 pages, 1518 KiB  
Article
Decentralized Storage with Access Control and Data Persistence for e-Book Stores
by Keigo Ogata and Satoshi Fujita
Future Internet 2023, 15(12), 406; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi15120406 - 18 Dec 2023
Viewed by 2052
Abstract
The e-book services we use today have a serious drawback in that we will no longer be able to read the books we have purchased when the service is terminated. One way to solve this problem is to build a decentralized system that [...] Read more.
The e-book services we use today have a serious drawback in that we will no longer be able to read the books we have purchased when the service is terminated. One way to solve this problem is to build a decentralized system that does not depend on a specific company or organization by combining smart contracts running on the Ethereum blockchain and distributed storage such as an IPFS. However, a simple combination of existing technologies does not make the stored e-book data persistent, so the risk of purchased e-books becoming unreadable remains. In this paper, we propose a decentralized distributed storage called d-book-repository, which has both access management function and data durability for purchased e-books. This system uses NFTs as access rights to realize strict access control by preventing clients who do not have NFTs from downloading e-book data. In addition, e-book data stored on storage nodes in the distributed storage is divided into shards using Reed–Solomon codes, and each storage node stores only a single shard, thereby preventing the creation of nodes that can restore the entire content from locally stored data. The storage of each shard is not handled by a single node but by a group of nodes, and the shard is propagated to all nodes in the group using the gossip protocol, where erasure codes are utilized to increase the resilience against node departure. Furthermore, an incentive mechanism to encourage participation as a storage node is implemented using smart contracts. We built a prototype of the proposed system on AWS and evaluated its performance. The results showed that both downloading and uploading 100 MB of e-book data (equivalent to one comic book) were completed within 10 s using an instance type of m5.xlarge. This value is only 1.3 s longer for downloading and 2.2 s longer for uploading than the time required for a simple download/upload without access control, confirming that the overhead associated with the proposed method is sufficiently small. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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28 pages, 3646 KiB  
Article
Blockchain in Agriculture to Ensure Trust, Effectiveness, and Traceability from Farm Fields to Groceries
by Arvind Panwar, Manju Khari, Sanjay Misra and Urvashi Sugandh
Future Internet 2023, 15(12), 404; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi15120404 - 16 Dec 2023
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 5554
Abstract
Despite its status as one of the most ancient sectors worldwide, agriculture continues to be a fundamental cornerstone of the global economy. Nevertheless, it faces obstacles such as a lack of trust, difficulties in tracking, and inefficiencies in managing the supply chain. This [...] Read more.
Despite its status as one of the most ancient sectors worldwide, agriculture continues to be a fundamental cornerstone of the global economy. Nevertheless, it faces obstacles such as a lack of trust, difficulties in tracking, and inefficiencies in managing the supply chain. This article examines the potential of blockchain technology (BCT) to alter the agricultural industry by providing a decentralized, transparent, and unchangeable solution to meet the difficulties it faces. The initial discussion provides an overview of the challenges encountered by the agricultural industry, followed by a thorough analysis of BCT, highlighting its potential advantages. Following that, the article explores other agricultural uses for blockchain technology, such as managing supply chains, verifying products, and processing payments. In addition, this paper examines the constraints and challenges related to the use of blockchain technology in agriculture, including issues such as scalability, legal frameworks, and interoperability. This paper highlights the potential of BCT to transform the agricultural industry by offering a transparent and secure platform for managing the supply chain. Nevertheless, it emphasizes the need for involving stakeholders, having clear legislation, and possessing technical skills in order to achieve effective implementation. This work utilizes a systematic literature review using the PRISMA technique and applies meta-analysis as the research methodology, enabling a thorough investigation of the present information available. The results emphasize the significant and positive effect of BCT on agriculture, emphasizing the need for cooperative endeavors among governments, industry pioneers, and technology specialists to encourage its extensive implementation and contribute to the advancement of a sustainable and resilient food system. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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14 pages, 1084 KiB  
Article
Exploring the Factors Affecting Countries’ Adoption of Blockchain-Enabled Central Bank Digital Currencies
by Medina Ayta Mohammed, Carmen De-Pablos-Heredero and José Luis Montes Botella
Future Internet 2023, 15(10), 321; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi15100321 - 28 Sep 2023
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 3145
Abstract
Central bank-issued digital currencies have sparked significant interest and are currently the subject of extensive research, owing to their potential for rapid settlement, low fees, accessibility, and automated monetary policies. However, central bank digital currencies are still in their infancy and the levels [...] Read more.
Central bank-issued digital currencies have sparked significant interest and are currently the subject of extensive research, owing to their potential for rapid settlement, low fees, accessibility, and automated monetary policies. However, central bank digital currencies are still in their infancy and the levels of adoption vary significantly between nations, with a few countries seeing widespread adoption. We used partial least squares structural equation modeling to investigate the nonlinear relationship between key national development indicators and central bank digital deployment across 67 countries. We explore the technological, environmental, legal, and economic factors that affect central bank digital currency adoption by country. We found a statistically significant and positive correlation between countries’ central bank digital currency adoption status and a country’s level of democracy and public confidence in governance, and a negative association between regulatory quality and income inequality. There was no significant association between countries’ central bank digital currency adoption status and their level of network readiness, foreign exchange reserves, and sustainable development goal rank. Thus, we posit that a country that is highly democratic and has good governance adopts central bank digital currencies more readily than others. Based on our findings, we suggested areas for additional research and highlighted policy considerations related to the wider adoption of central bank digital currency. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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23 pages, 1006 KiB  
Article
Proof of Flow: A Design Pattern for the Green Energy Market
by Valerio Mandarino, Giuseppe Pappalardo and Emiliano Tramontana
Future Internet 2023, 15(9), 313; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi15090313 - 17 Sep 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1499
Abstract
The increased penetration of Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) in electricity markets has given rise to a new category of energy players, called Aggregators, whose role is to ensure fair remuneration for energy supplied by DERs, and support the smooth feeding of the intermittent [...] Read more.
The increased penetration of Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) in electricity markets has given rise to a new category of energy players, called Aggregators, whose role is to ensure fair remuneration for energy supplied by DERs, and support the smooth feeding of the intermittent energy produced into the distribution network. This paper presents a software solution, described as a design pattern, that governs the interaction between an Aggregator and DERs, leveraging blockchain technology to achieve a higher degree of decentralization, data integrity and security, through a properly designed, blockchain-based, smart contract. Thus, the proposed solution reduces the reliance on intermediaries acting as authorities, while affording transparency, efficiency and trust to the energy exchange process. Thanks to the underlying blockchain properties, generated events are easily observable and cannot be forged or altered. However, blockchain technology has inherent drawbacks, i.e., mainly the cost of storage and execution, hence our solution provides additional strategies for limiting blockchain usage, without undermining its strengths. Moreover, the design of our smart contract takes care of orchestrating the players, and copes with their potential mutual disagreements, which could arise from different measures of energy, providing an automatic decision process to resolve such disputes. The overall approach results in lower fees for running smart contacts supporting energy players and in a greater degree of fairness assurance. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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Review

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22 pages, 1538 KiB  
Review
A Survey on Blockchain-Based Federated Learning
by Lang Wu, Weijian Ruan, Jinhui Hu and Yaobin He
Future Internet 2023, 15(12), 400; https://doi.org/10.3390/fi15120400 - 12 Dec 2023
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 3400
Abstract
Federated learning (FL) and blockchains exhibit significant commonality, complementarity, and alignment in various aspects, such as application domains, architectural features, and privacy protection mechanisms. In recent years, there have been notable advancements in combining these two technologies, particularly in data privacy protection, data [...] Read more.
Federated learning (FL) and blockchains exhibit significant commonality, complementarity, and alignment in various aspects, such as application domains, architectural features, and privacy protection mechanisms. In recent years, there have been notable advancements in combining these two technologies, particularly in data privacy protection, data sharing incentives, and computational performance. Although there are some surveys on blockchain-based federated learning (BFL), these surveys predominantly focus on the BFL framework and its classifications, yet lack in-depth analyses of the pivotal issues addressed by BFL. This work aims to assist researchers in understanding the latest research achievements and development directions in the integration of FL with blockchains. Firstly, we introduced the relevant research in FL and blockchain technology and highlighted the existing shortcomings of FL. Next, we conducted a comparative analysis of existing BFL frameworks, delving into the significant problems in the realm of FL that the combination of blockchain and FL addresses. Finally, we summarized the application prospects of BFL technology in various domains such as the Internet of Things, Industrial Internet of Things, Internet of Vehicles, and healthcare services, as well as the challenges that need to be addressed and future research directions. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Blockchain and Web 3.0: Applications, Challenges and Future Trends)
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