Edgechain: an edge-IoT framework and prototype based on blockchain and smart contracts
Open accessAbstract
The emerging Internet of Things (IoT) is facing significant scalability and security challenges. On one hand, IoT devices are “weak” and need external assistance. Edge computing provides a promising direction addressing the deficiency of centralized cloud computing in scaling massive number of devices. On the other hand, IoT devices are also relatively “vulnerable” facing malicious hackers due to resource constraints. The emerging blockchain and smart contracts technologies bring a series of new security features for IoT and edge computing. In this paper, to address the challenges, we design and prototype an edge-IoT framework named “EdgeChain” based on blockchain and smart contracts. The core idea is to integrate a permissioned blockchain and the internal currency or “coin” system to link the edge cloud resource pool with each IoT device' account and resource usage, and hence behavior of the IoT devices. EdgeChain uses a credit-based resource management system to control how much resource IoT devices can obtain from edge servers, based on predefined rules on priority, application types, and past behaviors. Smart contracts are used to enforce the rules and policies to regulate the IoT device behavior in a nondeniable and automated manner. All the IoT activities and transactions are recorded into blockchain for secure data logging and auditing. We implement an EdgeChain prototype and conduct extensive experiments to evaluate the ideas. The results show that while gaining the security benefits of blockchain and smart contracts, the cost of integrating them into EdgeChain is within a reasonable and acceptable range.
Integrity signals
Registry
Cites
Statistics
Claims the paper makes
Claims other papers make about this one
Each is checked against this paper’s own text: does it say what the citing paper says it does?
Public blockchains are mostly reliable if the users strictly abide by the rules and regulations of the blockchain.
“Public blockchains are mostly reliable if the users strictly abide by the rules and regulations of the blockchain [86].”
From A survey on the adoption of blockchain in IoT: challenges and solutions (2021) · cites this paper as [86]
Trust module is yet to be included in the system to make it sustainable.
“Trust module is yet to be included in the system to make it sustainable.”
From A survey on the adoption of blockchain in IoT: challenges and solutions (2021) · cites this paper as [86]
Cites
Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash SystemPreprint
Nakamoto, S. (2019) · SSRN Electronic Journal · doi:10.2139/ssrn.3440802 · Cited by 14,600 · see citing works
Edge computing: Vision and challenges
Shi, W., Cao, J., Zhang, Q., Li, Y., & Xu, L. (2016) · IEEE Internet of Things Journal · doi:10.1109/jiot.2016.2579198 · Cited by 8,733 · see citing works
Fog computing and its role in the internet of things
Bonomi, F., Milito, R., Zhu, J., & Addepalli, S. (2012) · Proceedings of the first edition of the MCC workshop on Mobile cloud computing · doi:10.1145/2342509.2342513 · Cited by 6,244 · see citing works
(2013) · Cited by 5,372 · see citing works
Blockchains and smart contracts for the internet of things
Christidis, K., & Devetsikiotis, M. (2016) · IEEE Access · doi:10.1109/access.2016.2566339 · Cited by 4,552 · see citing works
Practical Byzantine fault tolerance
Castro, M., & Liskov, B. H. (1999) · Operating Systems Design and Implementation · doi:10.5555/296806.296824 · Cited by 4,026 · see citing works
The case for vm-based cloudlets in mobile computing
Satyanarayanan, M., Bahl, P., Caceres, R., & Davies, N. (2009) · IEEE Pervasive Computing · doi:10.1109/mprv.2009.82 · Cited by 3,660 · see citing works
The Constrained Application Protocol (CoAP)
Shelby, Z., Hartke, K., & Bormann, C. (2014) · doi:10.17487/rfc7252 · Cited by 2,605 · cited 1× · see citing works
“A typical compromise is to use lightweight IoT security protocols [13], [14], [16], [17], [15], [18].”
MethodBlockchain for IoT security and privacy: The case study of a smart home
Dorri, A., Kanhere, S. S., Jurdak, R., & Gauravaram, P. (2017) · 2017 IEEE International Conference on Pervasive Computing and Communications Workshops (PerCom Workshops) · doi:10.1109/percomw.2017.7917634 · Cited by 1,843 · cited 1× · see citing works
“Blockchain and smart contracts are being used to secure many different areas and we will not enumerate them here, but a few example efforts include securing smart home [39], securing 5G fog network handover [41], securing virtual machine orchestration [42], securing access control in IoT [43], and”
MethodSecurity of the Internet of Things: perspectives and challenges
Jing, Q., Vasilakos, A. V., Wan, J., Lu, J., & Qiu, D. (2014) · Wireless Networks · doi:10.1007/s11276-014-0761-7 · Cited by 1,257 · see citing works
Can blockchain strengthen the internet of things?
Kshetri, N. (2017) · IT Professional · doi:10.1109/mitp.2017.3051335 · Cited by 918 · see citing works
Future Edge Cloud and Edge Computing for Internet of Things Applications
Pan, J., & McElhannon, J. (2018) · IEEE Internet of Things Journal · doi:10.1109/jiot.2017.2767608 · Cited by 868 · see citing works
Self-citationA Comprehensive Study of Security of Internet-of-Things
Mosenia, A., & Jha, N. K. (2016) · IEEE Transactions on Emerging Topics in Computing · doi:10.1109/tetc.2016.2606384 · Cited by 817 · see citing works
Smart contract-based access control for the internet of things
Zhang, Y., Kasahara, S., Shen, Y., Jiang, X., & Wan, J. (2019) · IEEE Internet of Things Journal · doi:10.1109/jiot.2018.2847705 · Cited by 788 · see citing works
A Software Defined Fog Node Based Distributed Blockchain Cloud Architecture for IoT
Sharma, P. K., Chen, M.-Y., & Park, J. H. (2018) · IEEE Access · doi:10.1109/access.2017.2757955 · Cited by 676 · see citing works
When Mobile Blockchain Meets Edge Computing
Xiong, Z., Zhang, Y., Niyato, D. T., Wang, P., & Han, Z. (2018) · IEEE Communications Magazine · doi:10.1109/mcom.2018.1701095 · Cited by 570 · see citing works
A lightweight attribute-based encryption scheme for the Internet of Things
Yao, X., Chen, Z., & Tian, Y. (2014) · Future Generation Computer Systems · doi:10.1016/j.future.2014.10.010 · Cited by 349 · see citing works
Cloud/Fog Computing Resource Management and Pricing for Blockchain Networks
Xiong, Z., Feng, S., Wang, W., Niyato, D. T., Wang, P., & Han, Z. (2018) · IEEE Internet of Things Journal · doi:10.1109/jiot.2018.2871706 · Cited by 307 · see citing works
Blockchain in internet of things: Challenges and SolutionsPreprint
Dorri, A., Kanhere, S. S., & Jurdak, R. (2016) · arXiv (Cornell University) · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1608.05187 · Cited by 264 · see citing works
Decentralized blockchain-based electronic marketplaces
Subramanian, H. (2017) · Communications of the ACM · doi:10.1145/3158333 · Cited by 264 · see citing works
Decentralized Consensus for Edge-Centric Internet of Things: A Review, Taxonomy, and Research Issues
Yeow, K., Gani, A., Ahmad, R. W., Rodrigues, J. J. P. C., & Ko, K. (2017) · IEEE Access · doi:10.1109/access.2017.2779263 · Cited by 238 · see citing works
A lightweight authentication protocol for Internet of Things
Lee, J.-Y., Lin, W., & Huang, Y.-H. (2014) · International Symposium on Next-Generation Electronics · doi:10.1109/isne.2014.6839375 · Cited by 191 · see citing works
Manufacturer Usage Description Specification
Lear, E., Droms, R., & Romascanu, D. (2019) · doi:10.17487/rfc8520 · Cited by 189 · see citing works
Threats to Networking Cloud and Edge Datacenters in the Internet of Things
Puthal, D., Nepal, ., Ranjan, R. K., & Chen, J. (2016) · IEEE Cloud Computing · doi:10.1109/mcc.2016.63 · Cited by 180 · see citing works
Oppliger, R. (1997) · Communications of the ACM · doi:10.1145/253769.253802 · Cited by 138 · see citing works
(2014) · ;login:: the magazine of USENIX & SAGE · Cited by 131 · see citing works
A Brief History of Cloud Offload
Satyanarayanan, M. (2015) · GetMobile Mobile Computing and Communications · doi:10.1145/2721914.2721921 · Cited by 106 · see citing works
Perimeter-based defense against high bandwidth DDoS attacks
Chen, S., & Song, Q. (2005) · IEEE Transactions on Parallel and Distributed Systems · doi:10.1109/tpds.2005.74 · Cited by 103 · see citing works
Secure and Energy-Efficient Handover in Fog Networks Using Blockchain-Based DMM
Sharma, V., You, I., Palmieri, F., Jayakody, D. N. K., & Li, J. (2018) · IEEE Communications Magazine · doi:10.1109/mcom.2018.1700863 · Cited by 102 · see citing works
Using Blockchain and smart contracts for secure data provenance managementPreprint
Ramachandran, A., & Kantarcıoğlu, M. (2017) · arXiv (Cornell University) · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1709.10000 · Cited by 76 · see citing works
FlopCoin: A Cryptocurrency for Computation Offloading
Chatzopoulos, D., Ahmadi, M., Kosta, S., & Hui, P. (2017) · IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing · doi:10.1109/tmc.2017.2748133 · Cited by 72 · see citing works
Lightweight IKEv2: A Key Management Solution for both Compressed IPsec and IEEE 802.15.4 Security
Raza, S., Voigt, T., & Vilhelm, J. (2012) · Cited by 63 · see citing works
Securing virtual machine orchestration with blockchains
Bozic, N., Pujolle, G., & Secci, S. (2017) · Cyber Security in Networking Conference (CSNet) · doi:10.1109/csnet.2017.8242003 · Cited by 44 · see citing works
BeyondCorp: Design to Deployment at Google
Osborn, B., McWilliams, J., Beyer, B., & Saltonstall, M. (2016) · Cited by 41 · see citing works
HomeCloud: An edge cloud framework and testbed for new application delivery
Pan, J., Ma, L., Ravindran, R., & TalebiFard, P. (2016) · doi:10.1109/ict.2016.7500391 · Cited by 37 · see citing works
Self-citationState-of-the-Art and Challenges for the Internet of Things Security
García-Morchón, Ó., Kumar, S., & Sethi, M. (2018) · Cited by 23 · see citing works
Minimal Internet Key Exchange Version 2 (IKEv2) Initiator Implementation
Kivinen, T. (2016) · doi:10.17487/rfc7815 · Cited by 14 · see citing works
Flagged first, then by citations
Cited by
Sorted by citations
A survey on the adoption of blockchain in IoT: challenges and solutions
Uddin, M. A., Stranieri, A., Gondal, I., & Balasubramanian, V. (2021) · Blockchain: Research and Applications · doi:10.1016/j.bcra.2021.100006 · Cited by 365 · see citing works
Blockchain for Edge of Things: Applications, Opportunities, and Challenges
Gadekallu, T. R., Pham, Q.-V., Nguyen, D. C., Maddikunta, P. K. R., Deepa, N., Prabadevi, B., Pathirana, P. N., Zhao, J., & Hwang, W.-J. (2022) · IEEE Internet of Things Journal · doi:10.1109/jiot.2021.3119639 · Cited by 217 · see citing works
Kumar, G., Saha, R., Rai, M. K., Thomas, R., & Kim, T.-H. (2019) · IEEE Internet of Things Journal · doi:10.1109/jiot.2019.2911969 · Cited by 145 · see citing works
Alzoubi, Y. I., Gill, A., & Mishra, A. (2022) · Journal of Cloud Computing · doi:10.1186/s13677-022-00353-y · Cited by 60 · see citing works
Policy specification and verification for blockchain and smart contracts in 5g networks
Unal, D., Hammoudeh, M., & Kiraz, M. S. (2020) · ICT Express · doi:10.1016/j.icte.2019.07.002 · Cited by 59 · see citing works
Blockchain-based resource allocation model in fog computing
Wang, H., Wang, L., Zhou, Z., Tao, X., Pau, G., & Arena, F. (2019) · Applied Sciences · doi:10.3390/app9245538 · Cited by 58 · see citing works
“[42] designed a marginal Internet of things framework, called EdgeChain internal tokens.”
Background
- Authors
- Pan, J., Wang, J., Hester, A., Alqerm, I., Liu, Y., & Zhao, Y.
- Affiliations
- University of Missouri–St. Louis (US)
- Chongqing University of Posts and Telecommunications (CN)
- Shandong Labor Vocational and Technical College (CN)
- Venue
- IEEE Internet of Things Journal
- Published
- 2019-06
- Volume
- 6
- Issue
- 3
- Pages
- 4719-4732
- ISSN
- 2327-4662 (ISSN-L)
- 2372-2541
- OpenAlex
- W2962740246
- Cited by
- 297
- References
- 37
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 19 · 2024: 29 · 2023: 44 · 2022: 52 · 2021: 55 · 2020: 51 · 2019: 27 · 2018: 2
- FWCI
- 54.32
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- green
- arxiv.org
- Licence
- Locations
- IEEE Internet of Things Journal (publishedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University) (submittedVersion)
- arXiv (Cornell University)
- Funders
- National Security Agency (H98230-17-1-0393, H98230-17-1-0352)
- National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NNX15AK38A)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Blockchain Technology Applications and Security
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Networks and Communications › IoT and Edge/Fog Computing
- Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Information Systems › Internet of Things and AI
- Keywords
- edge computing, Internet of Things, blockchain, smart contracts, permissioned blockchain, Internet of Things security, resource management, auditing
About these checks
Registry, retraction, Cites and statistics results are computed, not judged, with one exception: a printed reference that no index lists is read once by a model before it counts as a citation error. Claims are extracted by a model and kept only when their quote appears verbatim in the text; each cited source is then checked, with a model’s help, for whether it says what the claim relies on. Those verdicts can be wrong — read the claim’s quote and the cited source before relying on one.
Statistics and arithmetic are recomputed, not judged.
Confidence bands are shown only for fields calibrated on our annotated test set. None is calibrated yet, so no band is shown.
What counts as a claim ›How we measure confidence ›How we check this ›
Are you an author, or do you see a problem with this page? Request a review
