[AISWorld] CfP - Frontiers in Blockchain Call for Papers: Addressing Trust Issues in Blockchain Smart Contracts and Data to Achieve Trusted Information Systems

[Marco Comuzzi]

[Apologies if you receive multiple copies of this CfP]

==============================================================================

Frontiers in Blockchain Call for Papers:
Addressing Trust Issues in Blockchain Smart Contracts and Data to Achieve 
Trusted Information Systems

- Submission deadline: 14th November 2021

==============================================================================

Over the last few years, both researchers and practitioners have considered 
the adoption of blockchain-based architectures to build trusted information 
systems. Thanks to their distributed nature and their ability to reach 
consensus among untrusted parties, blockchains proved to be successful in 
exchanging assets (e.g., cryptocurrency) in a trusted way. In particular, it 
is almost impossible for a single party or a restricted group to alter or 
delete the information stored in the blockchain. In addition, second-
generation blockchains have introduced the so-called smart contracts, 
arbitrary agreements embodied by immutable code executed among multiple 
participants with possibly conflicting interests.

Despite the advantages of blockchains, building an information system – or 
part of it – on top of a blockchain is not sufficient for making it trusted.

Although the mechanisms handling the execution of smart contracts, as well as 
the ones handling data that originate from the blockchain itself, can be 
considered secure, the same cannot be said for the smart contracts and for 
the data that they receive as input. First, smart contracts may contain code 
vulnerabilities, which may cause unexpected behaviors and be exploited by 
malicious agents. For example, in 2016 a vulnerability in a smart contract 
allowed 3.6 million ETH to be stolen, causing the so-called DAO accident, 
which forced a hard fork in the Ethereum blockchain.

Another major issue is represented by input data originating from outside of 
the blockchain. Such data is not subject to the tight consistency constraints 
implemented by blockchains. Consequently, these data may contain errors, or 
they may come from unreliable sources. For example, several projects 
exploiting blockchain technology to track supply chain operations rely on 
sensor data, which may become unreliable when sensors are low on battery.

To achieve this goal, contributions may include, but not be limited to, the 
following important and interesting areas:
- Assessing and improving the quality of smart contract code.
- Guaranteeing that smart contract code is trusted by design.
- Evaluating the risk and the impact of vulnerable smart contracts in 
  blockchain-based information systems.
- Assessing and improving the quality of external data being included in the 
  blockchain.
- Assessing the reliability of the external data sources being used in a 
  blockchain-based information system.
- Keeping track of the provenance of input data external to the blockchain.
- Methods for verifying the compliance of blockchain-based information system 
  with respect to security and privacy requirements.
- Methods for designing secure and privacy-aware blockchain-based information 
  systems.
- Building secure- and data quality-aware blockchain oracles.
- Building secure- ad data quality-aware blockchains.
- Developing trusted hybrid (both on-chain and off-chain) applications.

Keywords: Trusted information systems, Smart contract quality, Blockchain data 
quality, Secure smart contracts, Off-chain data assessment

==============================================================================

Submission deadline: 14th November 2021

Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the 
scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in 
their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an 
out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of 
peer review.

All submitted articles are peer reviewed.

All published articles are subject to article processing charges. We work 
with numerous institutions to ensure researchers are supported when 
publishing open access.

See if your institution has a payment plan with us. 
https://www.frontiersin.org/about/institutional-membership

Find out about applying for fee support. 
https://www.frontiersin.org/about/publishing-fees

==============================================================================

Topic Editors:

Giovanni Meroni, Politecnico di Milano, Italy
Marco Comuzzi, Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, South Korea
Julius Koepke, Alpen-Adria Universitaet Klagenfurt, Austria

For more details, please refer to:
https://www.frontiersin.org/research-topics/22165/addressing-trust-issues-in-blockchain-
smart-contracts-and-data-to-achieve-trusted-information-system

Looking forward to receiving your manuscripts. Thank you!

Best regards,

Giovanni Meroni, PhD
Research Assistant
Politecnico di Milano
Via Ponzio 34/5, 20133 Milano, Italy