Theme and Scope

Cryptographic primitives gave rise to the concept of blockchain. Blockchain underpins various cryptocurrencies and non-centralized ledger-based transactional infrastructures, which have been deployed in applications such as finance, electronic health care, legal relations, IoT, information security, signature-based smart contracts and consensus building systems. There is a need of suitable cryptographic approaches to fulfill the existing gaps of blockchain technology. For example, fulfillment of a certain equilibrium-based consensus algorithm is undoubtably considered as a new and disruptive technology that will shape the future eCommerce. On one hand, security and trust are detrimental factors for the energy demanding Proof(s) of Work (consensus). On the other hand, maintaining Cyber resilience through NP-hard problems is a challenging task. State-of-the-art of the cryptographic techniques being deployed so far in the blockchain systems needs to be investigated as these techniques are fundamental building blocks to provide security to the blockchain. A thorough Systematization of Knowledge (SoK), that offers a complete bibliographic survey of the full crypto functionalities, tools, and interactions inside the blockchain, is imperative. There is an urgent need to realize and understand the security limitations, efficacy and performance of various types of blockchain-enabled protocols. Considering the above issues, there is a wide scope to improve the robustness of blockchain and hence utilize the blockchain for various applications.

This special issue invites researchers to publish selected original manuscripts to address the above concerns. Special emphasis shall be offered on “private blockchains”, “energy consumption problem blockchain”, “security resilience of blockchain during mining operations”, “investing towards a greener blockchain”, and “secure blockchain-based applications”.

Finally, we encourage envisioning applicability scenario(s) proposals for the ledger such as decentralizing NP-hard/complete computational problems in Genomics, Economics, and Quantum logic to name a few. We are also interested in review or survey articles that describe the state-of-the-art of this topic encompassing significant gaps/challenges in the research, major advancements, key findings, open problems, and future scope.

Following are the suggested topics but are not limited to:

• Data decentralization of NP-hard problems (e.g. Fully-homomorphic computations and bootstrapping)
• Normalizing equilibrium for P=NP using the ledger
• Proof of retrievability schemes for blockchain
• Leveraging post quantum cryptography in blockchain
• Leveraging lightweight cryptography for blockchain-based Internet of Things
• Private information retrieval and searchable symmetric encryption over the cloud with blockchain
• Commitment schemes using blockchain
• Deploying blockchain for secret sharing of data
• Electronic voting using blockchain
• Authentication-based encryption using blockchain
• Post-Quantum true random number generators with ledger technologies
• True noise obfuscation for oblivious signaling communication channels with blockchain technologies
• Adopting identity-based cryptography in blockchain
• Data mining and machine learning techniques for blockchain
• Testbeds, simulations, Hyperledger infrastructure(s), etc., for testing blockchain
• Post-Quantum cryptanalysis of blockchain
• Post-Quantum cryptographic techniques for blockchain

Instructions for Manuscripts

Each paper, written in English, the maximum words number in each paper should be below 8,000 words, including references and illustrations. More information can be found at https://jit.ndhu.edu.tw/. Before submission authors should carefully read over the journal’s Author Guidelines, which are located at https://jit.ndhu.edu.tw/about/submissions#authorGuidelines. Prospective authors should submit an electronic copy of their complete manuscript through the journal Manuscript Tracking System at https://mc04.manuscriptcentral.com/internet-tech. When submitting papers, authors should specify that the manuscript is for Special Issue on “Cryptography for Secure Blockchain”. The manuscript template can be found at https://jit.ndhu.edu.tw/about/submissions#authorGuideline.

Important Dates:

Deadline for submissions: 31 December 2021 

31 January 2022 4 March 2022

First Notification: 31 March 2022

Deadline for revisions: 30 April 2022

Final Decision: 31 May 2022

Tentative Publication: the second quarter of 2023

Guest Editors

Dr. Chien-Ming Chen

Collage of Computer Science and Engineering, Shandong University of Science and Technology, China

Email: chienmingchen@ieee.org

Dr. Kuo-Hui Yeh

Department Information Management, National Dong Hwa University, Taiwan

Email: khyeh@gms.ndhu.edu.tw

Dr. Lyes Khoukhi

GREYC CNRS UMR lab, ENSICAEN, Normandie University, France

Email: lyes.khoukhi@ensicaen.fr

Dr. Chan Yeob Yeun

Khalifa University, Abu Dhabi, UAE

Email: chan.yeun@ku.ac.ae