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Blockchain interoperability: the state of heterogenous blockchain-to-blockchain communication
(2023)
Blockchain technology has been increasingly adopted over the past few years since the introduction of Bitcoin, with several blockchain architectures and solutions being proposed. Most proposed solutions have been developed in isolation, without a standard protocol or cryptographic structure to work with. This has led to the problem of interoperability, where solutions running on different blockchain platforms are unable to communicate, limiting the scope of use. With blockchains being adopted in a variety of fields such as the Internet of Things, it is expected that the problem of interoperability if not addressed quickly, will stifle technology advancement. This paper presents the current state of interoperability solutions proposed for heterogenous blockchain systems. A look is taken at interoperability solutions, not only for cryptocurrencies, but also for general data-based use cases. Current open issues in heterogenous blockchain interoperability are presented. Additionally, some possible research directions are presented to enhance and to extend the existing blockchain interoperability solutions. It was discovered that though there are a number of proposed solutions in literature, few have seen real-world implementation. The lack of blockchain-specific standards has slowed the progress of interoperability. It was also realized that most of the proposed solutions are developed targeting cryptocurrency-based applications.
Digital transformation strengthens the interconnection of companies in order to develop optimized and better customized, cross-company business models. These models require secure, reliable, and traceable evidence and monitoring of contractually agreed information to gain trust between stakeholders. Blockchain technology using smart contracts allows the industry to establish trust and automate cross-company business processes without the risk of losing data control. A typical cross-company industry use case is equipment maintenance. Machine manufacturers and service providers offer maintenance for their machines and tools in order to achieve high availability at low costs. The aim of this chapter is to demonstrate how maintenance use cases are attempted by utilizing hyperledger fabric for building a chain of trust by hardened evidence logging of the maintenance process to achieve legal certainty. Contracts are digitized into smart contracts automating business that increase the security and mitigate the error-proneness of the business processes.
The integration of Internet of Things devices onto the Blockchain implies an increase in the transactions that occur on the Blockchain, thus increasing the storage requirements.
A solution approach is to leverage cloud resources for storing blocks within the chain. The paper, therefore, proposes two solutions to this problem. The first being an improved hybrid architecture design which uses containerization to create a side chain on a fog node for the devices connected to it and an Advanced Time‑variant Multi‑objective Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm (AT‑MOPSO) for determining the optimal number of blocks that should be transferred to the cloud for storage. This algorithm uses time‑variant weights for the velocity of the particle swarm optimization and the non‑dominated sorting and mutation schemes from NSGA‑III. The proposed algorithm was compared with results from the original MOPSO algorithm, the Strength Pareto Evolutionary Algorithm (SPEA‑II), and the Pareto Envelope‑based Selection Algorithm with region‑based selection (PESA‑II), and NSGA‑III. The proposed AT‑MOPSO showed better results than the aforementioned MOPSO algorithms in cloud storage cost and query probability optimization. Importantly, AT‑MOPSO achieved 52% energy efficiency compared to NSGA‑III.
To show how this algorithm can be applied to a real‑world Blockchain system, the BISS industrial Blockchain architecture was adapted and modified to show how the AT‑MOPSO can be used with existing Blockchain systems and the benefits it provides.
In recent years, both the Internet of Things (IoT) and blockchain technologies have been highly influential and revolutionary. IoT enables companies to embrace Industry 4.0, the Fourth Industrial Revolution, which benefits from communication and connectivity to reduce cost and to increase productivity through sensor-based autonomy. These automated systems can be further refined with smart contracts that are executed within a blockchain, thereby increasing transparency through continuous and indisputable logging. Ideally, the level of security for these IoT devices shall be very high, as they are specifically designed for this autonomous and networked environment. This paper discusses a use case of a company with legacy devices that wants to benefit from the features and functionality of blockchain technology. In particular, the implications of retrofit solutions are analyzed. The use of the BISS:4.0 platform is proposed as the underlying infrastructure. BISS:4.0 is
intended to integrate the blockchain technologies into existing enterprise environments. Furthermore, a security analysis of IoT and blockchain present attacks and countermeasures are presented that are identified and applied to the mentioned use case.