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An Overview of Blockchain Consensus and Vulnerability

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Information and Communication Technology for Intelligent Systems ( ICTIS 2020)

Abstract

Bitcoin, a secure and transparent peer-to-peer payment system, is the origin of blockchain technology. Blockchain has the capability to stores data records in a secure and immutable way without the centralized control. It achieves a goal through a novel decentralized consensus that provides a platform in trustless environment. Consensus mechanism plays an important role to maintain consistency and security in blockchain platform. In this paper, we have discussed the Byzantine Generals Problem and surveyed several popular consensus mechanisms in current blockchain networks. A comparison table of blockchain consensus is presented on the basis of some parameters. This table can be helpful for understanding consensus advantages and disadvantages and its usability in blockchain platform. Vulnerability like 51% in consensus is common in permissionless blockchain which is discussed, and also, some other failures are mentioned in this paper.

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Correspondence to Gajala Praveen .

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Praveen, G., Anand, M., Singh, P.K., Ranjan, P. (2021). An Overview of Blockchain Consensus and Vulnerability. In: Senjyu, T., Mahalle, P.N., Perumal, T., Joshi, A. (eds) Information and Communication Technology for Intelligent Systems. ICTIS 2020. Smart Innovation, Systems and Technologies, vol 195. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-7078-0_44

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