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On Cancellation of Transactions in Bitcoin-Like Blockchains

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On the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems. OTM 2018 Conferences (OTM 2018)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 11229))

Abstract

Bitcoin-like blockchains do not envisage any specific mechanism to avoid unfairness for the users. Hence, unfair situations, like impossibility of cancellation of transactions explicitly or having unconfirmed transactions, reduce the satisfaction of users dramatically, and, as a result, they may leave the system entirely. Such a consequence would impact significantly the security and the sustainability of the blockchain. Based on this observation, in this paper, we focus on explicit cancellation of transactions to improve the fairness for users. We propose a novel scheme with which it is possible to cancel a transaction, whether it is confirmed in a block or not, under certain conditions. We show that the proposed scheme is superior to the existing workarounds and is implementable for Bitcoin-like blockchains.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Replace_by_fee, last access on 16 July 2018.

  2. 2.

    Jae Kwon and Ethan Buchman. Tendermint. https://tendermint.readthedocs.io/en/master/specification.html, last access on 25 July 2018.

  3. 3.

    For each transaction tx inside \(b_i\), the block height |tx| is the equal to h also.

  4. 4.

    The current maximum block size in Bitcoin is 1 MB. See https://bitcoin.org/en/glossary/block-size-limit, last access on 13 July 2018.

  5. 5.

    Average block size for Bitcoin is given in https://blockchain.info/charts/avg-block-size, last access on 13 July 2018.

  6. 6.

    This description is based on the system and rational models given in [7].

  7. 7.

    A detailed list of behaviors, along with their pseudo-codes, can be found in [7].

  8. 8.

    https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Transaction_fees, last access on 20 July 2018.

  9. 9.

    It is important to note that the fee paid to the miner is not considered.

  10. 10.

    This complies with previous usage of transactions that are ‘non-final’: https://bitcoin.stackexchange.com/questions/9165/whats-are-non-final-transactions, last access on 13 July 2018.

  11. 11.

    The concept that indicates that money available at the present time worths more than the identical sum in the future due to its potential earning capacity.

  12. 12.

    http://www.gnuplot.info/, last access on 24 July 2018.

  13. 13.

    https://bitcoinfees.earn.com/, last access on 24 July 2018.

  14. 14.

    If there is a malicious participant that is partitioning the network, this is called a man-in-the-middle-attack.

  15. 15.

    https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0112.mediawiki, last access on 28 August 2018.

  16. 16.

    Operation codes from the Bitcoin Script language which push data or perform functions within a pubkey script or signature script.

  17. 17.

    https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0068.mediawiki, last access on 28 August 2018.

  18. 18.

    https://prestwi.ch/bitcoin-time-locks/, last access on 28 August 2018.

  19. 19.

    https://github.com/bitcoin/bips/blob/master/bip-0065.mediawiki, last access on 28 August 2018.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. CEA LIST, Point Courrier 174, 91191, Gif-sur-Yvette, France

    Önder Gürcan, Alejandro Ranchal Pedrosa & Sara Tucci-Piergiovanni

  2. LIP6 – Sorbonne Université, Paris, France

    Alejandro Ranchal Pedrosa

  3. EIT Digital, Stockholm, Sweden

    Alejandro Ranchal Pedrosa

Authors
  1. Önder Gürcan
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  2. Alejandro Ranchal Pedrosa
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  3. Sara Tucci-Piergiovanni
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Önder Gürcan .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. CNRS, University of Lorraine, Vandoeuvre-les-Nancy, France

    Hervé Panetto

  2. Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

    Christophe Debruyne

  3. Luxembourg Institute of Science and Technology, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg

    Henderik A. Proper

  4. Università degli Studi di Milano, Crema, Italy

    Claudio Agostino Ardagna

  5. SINTEF and University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Dumitru Roman

  6. TU Graz, Graz, Austria

    Robert Meersman

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Gürcan, Ö., Ranchal Pedrosa, A., Tucci-Piergiovanni, S. (2018). On Cancellation of Transactions in Bitcoin-Like Blockchains. In: Panetto, H., Debruyne, C., Proper, H., Ardagna, C., Roman, D., Meersman, R. (eds) On the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems. OTM 2018 Conferences. OTM 2018. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11229. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02610-3_29

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-02610-3_29

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-02609-7

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-02610-3

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