Liu Ang, Chen Xiu-Bo, Xu Shengwei, Wang Zhuo, Li Zhengyang, Xu Liwei, Zhang Yanshuo, Chen Ying
Information Security Center, State Key Laboratory of Networking and Switching Technology, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Beijing 100876, China.
Beijing Electronic Science and Technology Institute, Beijing 100070, China.
Entropy (Basel). 2023 May 17;25(5):811. doi: 10.3390/e25050811.
Blockchain technology affords data integrity protection and building trust mechanisms in transactions for distributed networks, and, therefore, is seen as a promising revolutionary information technology. At the same time, the ongoing breakthrough in quantum computation technology contributes toward large-scale quantum computers, which might attack classic cryptography, seriously threatening the classic cryptography security currently employed in the blockchain. As a better alternative, a quantum blockchain has high expectations of being immune to quantum computing attacks perpetrated by quantum adversaries. Although several works have been presented, the problems of impracticality and inefficiency in quantum blockchain systems remain prominent and need to be addressed. First, this paper develops a quantum-secure blockchain (QSB) scheme by introducing a consensus mechanism-quantum proof of authority (QPoA) and an identity-based quantum signature (IQS)-wherein QPoA is used for new block generation and IQS is used for transaction signing and verification. Second, QPoA is developed by adopting a quantum voting protocol to achieve secure and efficient decentralization for the blockchain system, and a quantum random number generator (QRNG) is deployed for randomized leader node election to protect the blockchain system from centralized attacks like distributed denial of service (DDoS). Compared to previous work, our scheme is more practical and efficient without sacrificing security, greatly contributing to better addressing the challenges in the quantum era. Extensive security analysis demonstrates that our scheme provides better protection against quantum computing attacks than classic blockchains. Overall, our scheme presents a feasible solution for blockchain systems against quantum computing attacks through a quantum strategy, contributing toward quantum-secured blockchain in the quantum era.
区块链技术为分布式网络中的交易提供数据完整性保护并构建信任机制，因此被视为一种有前途的革命性信息技术。与此同时，量子计算技术的不断突破推动了大规模量子计算机的发展，这可能会攻击经典密码学，严重威胁区块链目前所采用的经典密码学安全。作为一种更好的替代方案，量子区块链有望抵御量子对手实施的量子计算攻击。尽管已经有一些相关研究，但量子区块链系统中不切实际和效率低下的问题仍然突出，需要加以解决。首先，本文通过引入一种共识机制——量子权威证明（QPoA）和一种基于身份的量子签名（IQS），开发了一种量子安全区块链（QSB）方案，其中QPoA用于生成新块，IQS用于交易签名和验证。其次，通过采用量子投票协议来开发QPoA，以实现区块链系统安全高效的去中心化，并部署量子随机数生成器（QRNG）用于随机化领导者节点选举，以保护区块链系统免受诸如分布式拒绝服务（DDoS）等集中式攻击。与之前的工作相比，我们的方案在不牺牲安全性的前提下更具实用性和效率，极大地有助于更好地应对量子时代的挑战。广泛的安全分析表明，我们的方案比经典区块链能更好地抵御量子计算攻击。总体而言，我们的方案通过量子策略为区块链系统抵御量子计算攻击提供了一种可行的解决方案，为量子时代的量子安全区块链做出了贡献。
