Neutral Host Small Cell Providers (SCP) represent a key element of the 5G vision of ultra-dense mobile networks. However, current business models mostly focus on multi-year agreements for large venues, such as stadiums and hotel chains. These business agreements are regulated through binding Service Level Agreements (SLAs), which tend to be too cumbersome and costly for smaller scale SCPs. As a result, the neutral host model does not scale up to its full potential. In this paper, we propose a framework to enable the participation of small- to medium-sized players in the cellular market as providers offering network resources to Mobile Network Operators (MNOs). To this purpose, we review the current and emerging spectrum and technology opportunities that SCPs can use for neutral host deployments. We also propose the use of blockchain-enabled smart contracts as a simple and cost-efficient alternative to traditional SLAs for small-scale SCPs. To demonstrate this, we describe a proof of concept implementation of an Ethereum-based smart contract platform for best-effort service between an SCP and an MNO. Our simulations on potential smart contract-based deployments in city centre Dublin show that the received signal strength in the considered area will increase by an average of $10$ percent.
Recently, mesh networking and blockchain are two of the hottest technologies in the telecommunications industry. Combining both can reformulate internet access and make connecting to the Internet not only easy, but affordable too. Hyperledger Fabric (HLF) is a blockchain framework implementation and one of the Hyperledger projects hosted by The Linux Foundation. We evaluate HLF in a real production mesh network and in the laboratory, quantify its performance, bottlenecks and limitations of the current implementation. We identify the opportunities for improvement to serve the needs of wireless …
Blockchain (BC) technology can revolutionize the future of communications by enabling decentralized and open sharing networks. In this paper, we propose the application of BC to facilitate Mobile Network Operators (MNOs) and other players such as Verticals or Over-The-Top (OTT) service providers to exchange Radio Access Network (RAN) resources (e.g., infrastructure, spectrum) in a secure, flexible and autonomous manner. In particular, we propose a BC-enabled reverse auction mechanism for RAN sharing and dynamic users' service provision in Beyond 5G networks, and we analyze its potential advant…
Thanks to rapid technological advances in the Internet of Things (IoT), a smart public safety (SPS) system has become feasible by integrating heterogeneous computing devices to collaboratively provide public protection services. While a service oriented architecture (SOA) has been adopted by IoT and cyber-physical systems (CPS), it is difficult for a monolithic architecture to provide scalable and extensible services for a distributed IoT based SPS system. Furthermore, traditional security solutions rely on a centralized authority, which can be a performance bottleneck or single point failure.…
Infrastructure sharing is a widely discussed and implemented approach and is successfully adopted in telecommunications networks today. In practice, it is implemented through prior negotiated Service Level Agreements (SLAs) between the parties involved. However, it is recognised that these agreements are difficult to negotiate, monitor and enforce. For future 6G networks, resource and infrastructure sharing is expected to play an even greater role. It will be a crucial technique for reducing overall infrastructure costs and increasing operational efficiencies for operators. More efficient SLA …
In recent years, there has been an increasing interest in incorporating blockchain for the Internet of Things (IoT) to address the inherent issues of IoT, such as single point of failure and data silos. However, blockchain alone cannot ascertain the authenticity and veracity of the data coming from IoT devices. The append-only nature of blockchain exacerbates this issue, as it would not be possible to alter the data once recorded on-chain. Trust and Reputation Management (TRM) is an effective approach to overcome the aforementioned trust issues. However, designing TRM frameworks for blockchain…
5G-enabled drones have potential applications in a variety of both military and civilian settings (e.g., monitoring and tracking of individuals in demonstrations and/or enforcing of social / physical distancing during pandemics such as COVID-19). Such applications generally involve the collection and dissemination of (massive) data from the drones to remote data centres for storage and analysis, for example via 5G networks. Consequently, there are security and privacy considerations underpinning 5G-enabled drone communications. We posit the potential of leveraging blockchain to facilitate priv…
Cloud architecture has become a valuable solution for different applications, such as big data analytics, due to its high-degree of availability, scalability and strategic value. However, there still remain challenges in managing cloud architecture, in areas such as cloud security. In this paper, we exploit software-defined networking (SDN) and blockchain technologies to secure cloud management platforms from a networking perspective. We develop a blockchain-powered SDN-enabled networking infrastructure in which the integration between blockchain-based security and autonomy management layer an…
Low throughput has been the biggest obstacle of large-scale blockchain applications. During the past few years, researchers have proposed various schemes to improve the systems' throughput. However, due to the inherent inefficiency and defects of the Internet, especially in data broadcasting tasks, these efforts all rendered unsatisfactory. In this paper, we propose a novel blockchain protocol which utilizes the satellite broadcasting network instead of the traditional Internet for data broadcasting and consensus tasks. An automatic resumption mechanism is also proposed to solve the unique com…
We are experiencing an unprecedented healthcare crisis caused by newly-discovered corona-virus disease (COVID-19). The outbreaks of COVID-19 reveal the frailties of existing healthcare systems. Therefore, the digital transformation of healthcare systems becomes an inevitable trend. During this process, the Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) plays a crucial role while intrinsic vulnerabilities of security and privacy deter the wide adoption of IoMT. In this article, we present a blockchain-enabled IoMT to address the security and privacy concerns of IoMT systems. We also discuss the solutions br…
The blockchain is a safe, reliable and innovative mechanism for managing numerous vehicles seeking connectivity. However, following the principles of the blockchain, the number of transactions required to update ledgers pose serious issues for vehicles as these may consume the maximum available energy. To resolve this, an efficient model is presented in this letter which is capable of handling the energy demands of the blockchain-enabled Internet of Vehicles (IoV) by optimally controlling the number of transactions through distributed clustering. Numerical results suggest that the proposed app…
With the recent popularity of Blockchain and other Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLT), blockchain enabled smart contract applications has attracted increased research focus. However, the immutability of the blocks, where the smart contracts are stored, causes conflicts with the traditional Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) models usually followed by software engineers. This clearly shows the unsuitability of the application of SDLC in designing blockchain enabled smart contract based applications. This research article addresses this current problem by first exploring the six tradition…
The innovation provided by network virtualization in 5G, together with standardization and openness boosted by the Open Radio Access Network (O-RAN) Alliance, has paved the way to a collaborative future in cellular systems, driven by flexible network sharing. Such advents are expected to attract new players like content providers and verticals, increasing competitiveness in the telecom market. However, scalability and trust issues are expected to arise, given the criticality of ownership traceability and resource exchanging in a sharing ecosystem. To address that, we propose integrating blockc…
A new framework for a secure and robust consensus in blockchain-based IoT networks is proposed using machine learning. Hyperledger fabric, which is a blockchain platform developed as part of the Hyperledger project, though looks very apt for IoT applications, has comparatively low tolerance for malicious activities in an untrustworthy environment. To that end, we propose AI-enabled blockchain (AIBC) with a 2-step consensus protocol that uses an outlier detection algorithm for consensus in an IoT network implemented on hyperledger fabric platform. The outlier-aware consensus protocol exploits a…
5G mobile networks provide additional benefits in terms of lower latency, higher data rates, and more coverage, in comparison to 4G networks, and they are also coming close to standardization. For example, 5G has a new level of data transfer and processing speed that assures users are not disconnected when they move from one cell to another; thus, supporting faster connection. However, it comes with its own technical challenges relating to resource management, authentication handover and user privacy protection. In 5G, the frequent displacement of the users among the cells as a result of repea…
IoT has enabled the rapid growth of smart remote healthcare applications. These IoT-based remote healthcare applications deliver fast and preventive medical services to patients at risk or with chronic diseases. However, ensuring data security and patient privacy while exchanging sensitive medical data among medical IoT devices is still a significant concern in remote healthcare applications. Altered or corrupted medical data may cause wrong treatment and create grave health issues for patients. Moreover, current remote medical applications' efficiency and response time need to be addressed an…
We present Saguaro, a permissioned blockchain system designed specifically for edge computing networks. Saguaro leverages the hierarchical structure of edge computing networks to reduce the overhead of wide-area communication by presenting several techniques. First, Saguaro proposes coordinator-based and optimistic protocols to process cross-domain transactions with low latency where the lowest common ancestor of the involved domains coordinates the protocol or detects inconsistency. Second, data are collected over hierarchy enabling higher-level domains to aggregate their sub-domain data. Fin…
IoT cloud enabled societal applications have dramatically increased in the recent past due to the thrust for innovations, notably through startup initiatives, in various sectors such as agriculture, healthcare, industry, and so forth. The existing IoT cloud solutions have led practitioners or researchers to a haphazard clutter of serious security hazards and performance inefficiencies. This paper proposes a blockchain enabled IoT cloud implementation to tackle the existing issues in smart cities. It particularly highlights the implementation of chaincodes for air quality monitoring systems in …
Privacy-preserving Blockchain-enabled Parametric Insurance via Remote Sensing and IoT
School of Computing, Australian National University（澳大利亚国立大学计算学院）；Faculty of Information Technology, Monash University（莫纳什大学信息技术学院）；Data61, CSIRO（CSIRO数据61）
It is widely expected that future networks of 6G and beyond will deliver on the unachieved goals set by 5G. Technologies such as Internet of Skills and Industry 4.0 will become stable and viable, as a direct consequence of networks that offer sustained and reliable mobile performance levels. The primary challenges for future technologies are not just low-latency and high-bandwidth. The more critical problem Mobile Service Providers (MSPs) will face will be in balancing the inflated demands of network connections and customers' trust in the network service, that is, being able to interconnect b…
Blockchain (BC), the technology behind the Bitcoin cryptocurrency system, is starting to be adopted for ensuring enhanced security and privacy in the Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem. Fervent research is currently being focused in both academia and industry in this domain. Proof of Work (PoW), a cryptographic puzzle, plays a vital role in ensuring BC security by maintaining a digital ledger of transactions, which are considered to be incorruptible. Furthermore, BC uses a changeable Public Key (PK) to record the identity of users, thus providing an extra layer of privacy. Not only in cryptocu…
The agricultural sector is still lagging behind from all other sectors in terms of using the newest technologies. For production, the latest machines are being introduced and adopted. However, pre-harvest and post-harvest processing are still done by following traditional methodologies while tracing, storing, and publishing agricultural data. As a result, farmers are not getting deserved payment, consumers are not getting enough information before buying their product, and intermediate person/processors are increasing retail prices. Using blockchain, smart contracts, and IoT devices, we can fu…
The amalgamation of different generations of mobile cellular networks around the globe has resulted in diverse data speed experiences for end users. At present there are no defined mechanisms in place for a subscriber of one mobile network operator (MNO) to use the services of a WiFi provider. Cellular and Data Service providers also have no standardized procedures to securely interact with each other, and to allow their subscribers to use third party services on a pay-as-you-go basis. This paper proposes a blockchain-based offloading framework that allows a subscriber of a mobile operator to …
Web 3.0 enables user-generated contents and user-selected authorities. With decentralized wireless edge computing architectures, Web 3.0 allows users to read, write, and own contents. A core technology that enables Web 3.0 goals is blockchain, which provides security services by recording content in a decentralized and transparent manner. However, the explosion of on-chain recorded contents and the fast-growing number of users cause increasingly unaffordable computing and storage resource consumption. A promising paradigm is to analyze the semantic information of contents that can convey preci…
Blockchain-enabled Federated Learning (BFL) enables mobile devices to collaboratively train neural network models required by a Machine Learning Model Owner (MLMO) while keeping data on the mobile devices. Then, the model updates are stored in the blockchain in a decentralized and reliable manner. However, the issue of BFL is that the mobile devices have energy and CPU constraints that may reduce the system lifetime and training efficiency. The other issue is that the training latency may increase due to the blockchain mining process. To address these issues, the MLMO needs to (i) decide how m…
The emergence of big data and Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology is reshaping the world. While the technological revolution improves the quality of our life, new concerns are triggered. The superhuman capability enables AI to outperform human workers in many data- and/or computing-intensive tasks. Also, digital superpowers are showing arrogance towards individuals, which erodes the trust foundation of the society. In this position paper, we suggest to construct trustworthy and safe communities based on a BLockchain-Enabled Social credits System (BLESS) that rewards the residents who commi…
IoT emerges as an unprecedented paradigm with great potential for changing how people interact, think and live. It is making existing Internet services feasible in ways that were previously impossible, as well as paving the way for new situation-awareness applications suitable for smart cities, such as realtime video surveillance, traffic control, and emergency management. These applications will typically rely on large numbers of IoT devices to collect and collaboratively process streamed data to enable real-time decision making. In this paper, we introduce the concept of Semantic Virtual Spa…
The future of healthcare systems is being shaped by incorporating emerged technological innovations to drive new models for patient care. By acquiring, integrating, analyzing, and exchanging medical data at different system levels, new practices can be introduced, offering a radical improvement to healthcare services. This paper presents a novel smart and secure Healthcare system (ssHealth), which, leveraging advances in edge computing and blockchain technologies, permits epidemics discovering, remote monitoring, and fast emergency response. The proposed system also allows for secure medical d…
The prevalence of Internet of Things (IoTs) allows heterogeneous embedded smart devices to collaboratively provide smart services with or without human intervention. While leveraging the large scale IoT based applications like Smart Gird or Smart Cities, IoTs also incur more concerns on privacy and security. Among the top security challenges that IoTs face, access authorization is critical in resource sharing and information protection. One of the weaknesses in today's access control (AC) is the centralized authorization server, which can be the performance bottleneck or the single point of fa…
Federated learning (FL), thanks in part to the emergence of the edge computing paradigm, is expected to enable true real-time applications in production environments. However, its original dependence on a central server for orchestration raises several concerns in terms of security, privacy, and scalability. To solve some of these worries, blockchain technology is expected to bring decentralization, robustness, and enhanced trust to FL. The empowerment of FL through blockchain (also referred to as FLchain), however, has some implications in terms of ledger inconsistencies and age of informatio…
The Internet of Medical Things (IoMT) offers an infrastructure made of smart medical equipment and software applications for health services. Through the internet, the IoMT is capable of providing remote medical diagnosis and timely health services. The patients can use their smart devices to create, store and share their electronic health records (EHR) with a variety of medical personnel including medical doctors and nurses. However, unless the underlying combination within IoMT is secured, malicious users can intercept, modify and even delete the sensitive EHR data of patients. Patients also…
The integration of air and ground smart vehicles is becoming a new paradigm of future transportation. A decent number of smart unmanned vehicles or UAS will be sharing the national airspace for various purposes, such as express delivery, surveillance, etc. However, the proliferation of UAS also brings challenges considering the safe integration of them into the current Air Traffic Management (ATM) systems. Especially when the current Automatic Dependent Surveillance Broadcasting (ADS-B) systems do not have message authentication mechanisms, it can not distinguish whether an authorized UAS is u…
Space situation awareness (SSA) includes tracking of active and inactive resident space objects (RSOs) and assessing the space environment through sensor data collection and processing. To enhance SSA, the dynamic data-driven applications systems (DDDAS) framework couples on-line data with off-line models to enhance system performance. Using feedback control, sensor management, and communications reliability. For information management, there is a need for identity authentication and access control to ensure the integrity of exchanged data as well as to grant authorized entities access right t…
Waterford Institute of Technology（沃特福德理工学院）；Walton Institute（沃尔顿研究所）；Northumbria University Newcastle（纽卡斯尔诺森比亚大学）；National University of Sciences and Technology（国立科技大学）
6G envisions artificial intelligence (AI) powered solutions for enhancing the quality-of-service (QoS) in the network and to ensure optimal utilization of resources. In this work, we propose an architecture based on the combination of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), AI and blockchain for agricultural supply-chain management with the purpose of ensuring traceability, transparency, tracking inventories and contracts. We propose a solution to facilitate on-device AI by generating a roadmap of models with various resource-accuracy trade-offs. A fully convolutional neural network (FCN) model is us…
The underlying fundaments of blockchain are cryptography and cryptographic concepts that provide reliable and secure decentralized solutions. Although many recent papers study the use-cases of blockchain in different industrial areas, such as finance, health care, legal relations, IoT, information security, and consensus building systems, only few studies scrutinize the cryptographic concepts used in blockchain. To the best of our knowledge, there is no Systematization of Knowledge (SoK) that gives a complete picture of the existing cryptographic concepts which have been deployed or have the p…
Network function virtualization (NFV) is a promising technology to make 5G networks flexible and agile. NFV decreases operators' OPEX and CAPEX by decoupling the physical hardware from the functions they perform. In NFV, users' service request can be viewed as a service function chain (SFC) consisting of several virtual network functions (VNFs) which are connected through virtual links. Resource allocation in NFV is done through a centralized authority called NFV Orchestrator (NFVO). This centralized authority suffers from some drawbacks such as single point of failure and security. Blockchain…
The combined cooling, heating and power (CCHP) system is a typical distributed, electricity-gas integrated energy scheme in a community. First, it generates electricity by use of gas, and then exploits the waste heat to supply community with heat and cooling. In this paper, we consider a smart city consisting of a number of communities (CCHPs) and an agent of power grid (APG), where CCHPs can sell energy to the APG according to its bid. To study all utilities of entities in such a city from energy trading, a noncooperative Stackelberg game between APG and CCHPs is formulated. Here, the APG giv…
Deploying mobile edge computing (MEC) server in the mobile blockchain-enabled Internet of things (IoT) system is a promising approach to improve the system performance, however, it imposes a significant challenge on the trust of MEC server. To address this problem, we first propose an untrusted MEC proof of work scheme in mobile blockchain network where plenty of nonce hash computing demands can be offloaded to MEC server. Then, we design a nonce ordering algorithm for this scheme to provide fairer computing resource allocation for all mobile IoT devices/users. Specifically, we formulate the u…
University of Guelph（圭尔夫大学）；University of Toronto（多伦多大学）
Over the years, the popularity and usage of wearable Internet of Things (IoT) devices in several healthcare services are increased. Among the services that benefit from the usage of such devices is predictive analysis, which can improve early diagnosis in e-health. However, due to the limitations of wearable IoT devices, challenges in data privacy, service integrity, and network structure adaptability arose. To address these concerns, we propose a platform using federated learning and private blockchain technology within a fog-IoT network. These technologies have privacy-preserving features se…
A new era in ICT has begun with the evolution of Next Generation Networks (NGNs) and the development of human-centric applications. Ultra-low latency, high throughput, and high availability are a few of the main characteristics of modern networks. Network Providers (NPs) are responsible for the development and maintenance of network infrastructures ready to support the most demanding applications that should be available not only in urban areas but in every corner of the earth. The NPs must collaborate to offer high-quality services and keep their overall cost low. The collaboration among comp…
Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) opens up a challenging research area towards improving secure data sharing which currently has several limitations. Primarily, the lack of inbuilt guarantees of honest behavior of participating, such as end-users or cloud behaving maliciously may result in disputes. Given such challenges, we propose a fair, accountable, and secure data sharing scheme, $\textit{FairShare}$ for IIoT. In this scheme, data collected from IoT devices are processed and stored in cloud servers with intermediate fog nodes facilitating computation. Authorized clients can access this…
The rise of fast communication media both at the core and at the edge has resulted in unprecedented numbers of sophisticated and intelligent wireless IoT devices. Tactile Internet has enabled the interaction between humans and machines within their environment to achieve revolutionized solutions both on the move and in real-time. Many applications such as intelligent autonomous self-driving, smart agriculture and industrial solutions, and self-learning multimedia content filtering and sharing have become attainable through cooperative, distributed and decentralized systems, namely, volunteer c…
Blockchain has become one of the most attractive technologies for applications, with a large range of deployments such as production, economy, or banking. Under the hood, Blockchain technology is a type of distributed database that supports untrusted parties. In this paper we focus Hyperledger Fabric, the first blockchain in the market tailored for a private environment, allowing businesses to create a permissioned network. Hyperledger Fabric implements a PBFT consensus in order to maintain a non forking blockchain at the application level. We deployed this framework over an area network betwe…
Blockchain and other distributed ledger technologies have enabled peer-to-peer networks to maintain ledgers with an immutable history and guaranteed computation, all carried out without the need of trusted parties. In practice, few applications of blockchain are closed i.e. do not interact with the world outside the blockchain, and various techniques have been proposed and used to handle such interaction. One problem is that it is widely accepted that, due to the decentralised nature of blockchain networks and constraints to ensure trust and determinism, such communication can only flow into t…
SRE-Llama -- Fine-Tuned Meta's Llama LLM, Federated Learning, Blockchain and NFT Enabled Site Reliability Engineering(SRE) Platform for Communication and Networking Software Services
