【Abstract】Facilities based on the Internet of Things and embedded systems along with the application of ambient intelligence paradigms offer new scenarios for optimization services in agronomic processes, specifically in the hemp industry. The traceability of products and activities demonstrates the scope of these technologies. However, the technologies themselves introduce integration-related problems that can affect the planned benefits. This article proposes a model that balances agricultural expert knowledge (user-centered design), value chain planning (through blockchain implementation), and digital technology (Internet of Things protocols) for providing tamper proof, transparent, and secure traceability in this agricultural sector. The proposed approach is backed by a proof-of-concept implementation in a realist scenario, using embedded devices and a permissioned blockchain. The model and its deployment fully integrate a set of services that other proposals only partially integrate. On one hand, the design creates a permissioned blockchain that contemplates the different actors in the value chain, and on the other hand, it develops services that use applications with human-machine interfaces. Finally, it deploys a network of embedded devices with Internet of Things protocols and control algorithms with automated access to the blockchain for traceability services. Combining digital systems with interoperable human tasks it has been possible to deploy a model that provides a new approach for the development of value-added services.
【Abstract】The extant literature suggests that digital technologies (big data analytics, artificial intelligence, blockchain) help firms gain a competitive advantage. However, the studies do not focus on the micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sector. Moreover, MSMEs face various challenges, including significant supply chain disruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Hence, there was an urgent requirement to shift to digital technologies to survive during this difficult time. In the context of MSME, various positive changes are discussed in the recent literature. However, a dearth of studies discusses the role of big data analytics capabilities (BDAC) to gain sustainable competitive advantage (SCA). Our study aims to fill this gap and answer this question - How do BDAC help MSMEs gain SCA? To understand the phenomenon, we receive theoretical support from organizational information processing theory (OIPT) and institutional theory (IT). We develop a conceptual framework that links BDAC and SCA through supply chain coordination, swift trust, and supply chain risk. Additionally, the age and size of the firm are used as control variables. The data is collected from Indian service sector employees of MSMEs, resulting in 497 usable responses. We use PLS-SEM using Warp PLS 7.0 to test the hypotheses. A critical finding is that the BDAC indirectly impacts the SCA. Finally, the other findings, limitations, and scope for future research are discussed.
【Abstract】Although previous research has provided insights into the direct effects of platform decentralization governance on market value, scholars have failed to theorize and empirically examine the mediating mechanisms through which platform decentralization governance transfers into increased or decreased market value. This article draws on signaling (Spence, 1973) and mechanism design theory (Hurwicz, 1973) to provide a theoretical un-derstanding of how voluntary disclosures and developers' activities mediate the relationship between platform decentralization and market value. We test our model with a sample of 682 largest market capitalization blockchain platforms. The results confirm our proposed mediation relationships that (1) centralization (or low decentralization) governance enhances platform market value via more voluntary disclosures, (2) decentral-ization enhances platform market value via facilitating developers' activities, and (3) centralization enhances market value via more voluntary disclosures that in turn facilitate developers' activities. Overall, our study offers both theoretical and practical implications regarding the governance structures that drive value for digital and blockchain platforms.
【Abstract】We employ a time-varying parameter vector autoregression (TVP-VAR) in combination with an extended joint connectedness approach to study interlinkages between four markets, namely the crude oil, gold, stock, and cryptocurrency markets, by characterizing the connectedness of these four markets, from January 1, 2018, to August 1, 2021. Our results demonstrate that health shocks appear to influence the system-wide dynamic connectedness, which reaches a peak during the COVID-19 pandemic. Net total directional connectedness sug-gests that the gold and stock markets consistently appear to be net receivers of spillover shocks. Crude oil appears to be a critical net transmitter of shocks for almost the whole pre-COVID-19 pandemic period, but it turns into an important net receiver during the COVID-19 pandemic. The cryptocurrency market acts as the time-varying net receiver and net transmitter of our network, and it has the most inconsiderable role within our studied network. Pairwise connectedness reveals that crude oil and stock are mostly receiving spillover effects from all the other markets, while gold could be either a net transmitter or a net receiver, depending on the types of market considered. Cryptocurrency is a volatile market, and its role varies constantly over time.
【Abstract】Stakeholders' pressure for environmental sustainability asks firms to develop ecosystem-based business models (EBMs) driven by a disruptive technology that strategically prioritizes green innovation. Given the infancy of the relevant issues, there is scarce empirical evidence addressing how blockchain technology (BT) as a typical disruptive technology triggers the formation of EBMs with higher levels of platformisation and stakeholder diversity. To address this need, from the dynamic capability view, we identify value appropriation capability (VAC) as a vital catalyst translating BT into realizing green innovation in EBMs. Our results indicate that BT and VAC positively affect green innovation performance, while VAC also mediates the BT-green innovation relationship in EBMs. The main contribution is to offer new insight into the mechanisms between disruptive technology and the evolution towards EBMs through the lens of a previously under-researched dynamic capability, VAC. We also provide feasible, practical guidance for organizations to inspire green innovation and establish sustainable EBMs.
【Abstract】Blockchain is a disruptive, decentralized, replicable, distributed ledger technology with the potential to change the conventional business landscape in banking and finance. This study consists of a bibliometric review and a content analysis of the academic literature dealing with the antecedents, the applications, and the consequences of the adoption of blockchain-based technologies in these highly interconnected industries. With a final sample of 154 papers published between 2009 and 2021, we map their influential aspects, in terms of trending topic, authors and target journals. We then provide a bibliographic analysis, which consists of co-authorship, cartographic, co-citation and coupling analyses. Finally, we identify the main literature streams and the future research agenda, which may serve as a valid starting point for future research in the field for both scholars and practitioners.
【Abstract】The case for CBDC does not just rest on its benefits or attractions, but also on its scope to avert potential problems associated with stablecoin. In this brief paper I critique the 'illustrative scenario' at the heart of the Bank of England's recent New Forms of Digital Money discussion paper. I suggest that it does not deal realistically with the motives and practices of issuers. The argument speaks to contradictory trends both in the urgency of regulation of stablecoin and the underlying case for CBDC.
【Abstract】Edge devices with sensing, storage, and communication resources are penetrating our daily lives. These resources make it possible for edge devices to conduct data transactions (e.g., micro-payments, micro-access control). The blockchain technology can be used to ensure transaction unmodifiable and undeniable. In this paper, we propose a blockchain system that adapts to the limitations of edge devices. The new blockchain system can fairly and efficiently allocate storage resources on edge devices, which makes it scalable. We find the optimal peer nodes for transaction data storage and propose a recent block storage allocation scheme for quick retrieval of missing blocks. We develop data migration algorithms to dynamically reallocate data and block storage to adapt topology changes in the network. The proposed blockchain system can also reach consensus with low energy consumption in edge devices with a new Proof of Stake mechanism. Extensive simulations show that our proposed blockchain system works efficiently in edge environments. On average, the new system uses 18.4 percent less time and consumes 87 percent less battery power when compared with traditional blockchain systems.
【Abstract】With the continuous development of edge computing and IIoT technology, there are growing types of IIoT devices, and the number of such devices is continuously climbing. It is indispensable to authenticate devices in the IIoT environment. In this paper, we propose two blockchain-based authentication for IIoT devices with PUF. The first one relies on SRAM PUF, which is highly compatible with physical devices and has low cost. For the second one, we utilize the property of Arbiter PUF that it is difficult to physically clone but easy to be cloned mathematically to build the PUF models for authentication. We protect CRPs used for model training from leakage, and prevent PUF from being modeled twice. We formalize the security properties, and we prove that our proposal is secure. Besides, our proposal achieves scalability, which means that the entities involved in the scheme authenticate the devices instead of storing amounts of CRPs. Finally, we take SVM as an example to model PUF, and the implementation results demonstrate that the PUF model could achieve the accuracy of 99.9%. In addition, we implement smart contracts, and the implementation results confirm the availability of the protocol in the IIoT environment.
【Abstract】With the rapid popularization and development of the Internet of Things (IoT) and 5G networks, mobile crowdsourcing (MCS) has become an indispensable part in today's society. However, when task participants submit tasks, they are likely to expose their data privacy and location privacy. These privacy will be maliciously attacked and exploited by attackers (external attackers and untrusted third party). With the rapid increase of MCS data throughput, traditional cloud platforms can no longer meet the huge data processing needs. To solve these problems, this paper proposes an MCS federated learning system based on Blockchain and edge computing. This paper uses federated learning as the framework of the MCS system. The system protects data privacy and location privacy by using the Double local disturbance Localized Differential Privacy (DLD-LDP) proposed in this paper. Because the sensed data exists in multiple modalities (text, video, audio, etc.), this paper uses the Multi-modal Transformer (MulT) method to merge the multi-modal data before subsequent operations. To solve the problem that the third party is untrusted, we utilize Blockchain to distribute tasks and collect models in a distributed way. A reputation calculation method (Sig-RCU) is proposed to calculate the real-time reputation of task participants. Through conducting experiments on real data sets, the effectiveness and adaptation of the proposed DLD-LDP algorithm and Sig-RCU algorithm are verified.
【Abstract】The role of public sentiment in traders' decision-making is potentially more pronounced in crypto-asset markets, given a lack of quantifiable financial fundamental information and historical precedent for pricing behaviour. Using a data set of over two million transactions executed on a cryptocurrency exchange, we test the extent to which sentiment conveyed within cryptocurrency communities on Reddit impacts upon the performance, deposit and withdrawal behaviour, and position exposure of cryptocurrency traders. Our evidence supports the notion that sentiment plays a role in the investment decision-making process. Traders tend to realise positive returns when sentiment is bullish. Moreover, positive changes in the level of bullishness lead to traders executing larger trades, and a higher probability of depositing and withdrawing funds. Measures such as the degree of consensus within the online crowd, readership size and contributor reputation produce less compelling results, but offer some insights into Reddit community dynamics.
【Abstract】Edge computing is becoming pervasive in our daily lives with emerging smart devices and the development of communication technology. Smart devices with various resources make data transactions prevalent over edge environments. To ensure such transactions are unmodifiable and undeniable, blockchain technology is introduced into edge environments. In this paper, we propose a hybrid blockchain system to enhance the security for transactions and determine the incentive for miners in edge computing environments. We propose a Proof of Work (PoW) and Proof of Stake (PoS) hybrid consensus blockchain system utilizing the heterogeneity of devices to adapt to the characteristic of edge environments. We raise the incentive assignment problem for a fair incentive to PoW miners. We formulate the problem and propose an iterative and another heuristic algorithm to determine the incentive that the miner will receive for a new block. We further prove that the iterative algorithm can obtain global optimal results. Simulation and experiment results show that our proposed algorithm can give a reasonable incentive to miners under different system parameters in edge blockchain systems.
【Abstract】This paper examines herding behavior in the cryptocurrency market during the COVID-19 pandemic using daily data and based on static and regime-switching models. Furthermore, we investigate whether herding behavior is affected by the coronavirus media coverage. Based on a sample of the top-43 cryptocurrencies in terms of market capitalization between 2013 and 2020, we find significant evidence of herding for the entire sample period only during high volatility state. Moreover, during the COVID-19 crisis, results suggest that investors in the cryptocurrency market follow the consensus. Finally, the impact of coronavirus media coverage is significant on herding among investors, explaining such behavior in the cryptocurrency market during the COVID-19 crisis. Our findings explain herding determinants that may help investors avoid such comportment, mainly during the crisis.
【Abstract】Many studies have discussed hedges and safe havens against stocks, but few studies focus on the hedging/safe-haven performance of assets against the currency market over different time horizons. This paper studies the connectedness, hedging and safe-haven properties of Bitcoin/gold/ crude oil/commodities against six currencies across multiple investment horizons, placing a particular focus on the performance of these assets during the recent COVID-19 outbreak. Our findings suggest that the overall dependence between assets and the currency market is the strongest in the short term, and Bitcoin is the least dependent across all investment horizons. The dynamic relationships between the four assets and the currency market vary with timescales. Bitcoin offers better hedging capability in the long term and commodities emerge as the most favorable option for the optimal portfolio of currency over all time horizons. Further analysis shows that assets are better at helping investments reduce risk in the initial stages of the pandemic, and gold is an effective and robust safe haven for currencies.
【Abstract】In this paper, we analyze the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on global stock sectors from two perspectives. First, to measure the effect of the COVID-19 on the volatility connectedness among global stock sectors in the time-frequency domain, we combine the time-varying connectedness and frequency connectedness method and focus on the total, directional, and net connectedness. The empirical results indicate a dramatic rise in the total connectedness among the global stock sectors following the outbreak of COVID-19. However, the high level of the total connectedness lasted only about two months, representing that the impact of COVID-19 is significant but not durable. Furthermore, we observe that the directional and net connectedness changes of different stock sectors during the COVID-19 pandemic are heterogeneous, and the diverse possible driving factors. In addition, the transmission of spillovers among sectors is driven mainly by the highfrequency component (short-term spillovers) during the full sample time. However, the effects of the COVID-19 outbreak also persisted in the long term. Second, we explore how the changing COVID-19 pandemic intensity (represented by the daily new COVID-19 confirmed cases and the daily new COVID-19 death cases worldwide) affect the daily returns of the global stock sectors by using the Quantile-on-Quantile Regression (QQR) methodology of Sim and Zhou (2015). The results indicate the different characteristics in responses of the stock sectors to the pandemic intensity. Specifically, most sectors are severely impacted by the COVID-19. In contrast, some sectors (Necessary Consume and Medical & Health) that are least affected by the COVID-19 pandemic (especially in the milder stage of the COVID-19 pandemic) are those that are related to the provision of goods and services which can be considered as necessities and substitutes. These results also hold after several robustness checks. Our findings may help understand the sectoral dynamics in the global stock market and provide significant implications for portfolio managers, investors, and government agencies in times of highly stressful events like the COVID19 crisis.
【Abstract】Smart contracts (i.e., agreements enforced by a blockchain) are supposed to work at lower transaction costs than traditional (and incomplete) contracts that instead exploit a costly legal enforcement. This paper challenges that claim. I argue that because of the need for adaptation to mutable and unpredictable occurrences (a chief challenge of transaction cost economics a la Oliver Williamson), smart contracts may incur higher transaction costs than traditional contracts. This paper focuses on two problems related to the adaptation: first, smart contracts are constructed to limit and potentially avoid any ex-post legal intervention, including efficiency-enhancing adaptation by courts. Second, the consensus mechanism on which every smart contract depends may lead to additional transaction costs due to a majority-driven adaptation of the blockchain that follows Mancur Olson's Logic of groups. The paper further proposes several institutional expedients that may reduce these transaction costs of smart contracts. (C) 2022 Massimiliano Vatiero. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
【Abstract】We introduce a new notion called accountable attribute-based authentication with fine-grained access control (AccABA), which achieves (i) fine-grained access control that prevents ineligible users from authenticating; (ii) anonymity such that no one can recognize the identity of a user; (iii) public accountability, i.e., as long as a user authenticates two different messages, the corresponding authentications will be easily identified and linked, and anyone can reveal the user's identity without any help from a trusted third party. Then, we formalize the security requirements in terms of unforgeability, anonymity, linkability and traceability, and give a generic construction to fulfill these requirements. Based on AccABA, we further present the first attribute-based, fair, anonymous and publicly traceable crowdsourcing scheme on blockchain, which is designed to filter qualified workers to participate in tasks, and ensures the fairness of the competition between workers, and finally balances the tension between anonymity and accountability.
【Abstract】The advancement in blockchain technology has enabled smart contracts to automate the execution of tenancy obligations, known as "smart tenancies". This paper analyses the legal issues on the adoption of smart tenancies within Malaysia using legal doctrinal research method. We seek to answer these questions: (1) whether smart tenancies are enforceable in Malaysia; (2) whether parties to a smart tenancy can apply for an endorsement of tenancy under the National Land Code; (3) whether the legal profession can claim exclusivity in offering and maintaining smart tenancies services; and (4) whether there is room for self-help in resolving tenancy disputes using smart tenancies in Malaysia. The key findings are as follows: (1)(a) smart tenancies can and should be stamped when the user interface stipulates the information required for calculation of stamp duty; (1)(b) smart tenancies service provider have to comply with the Electronic Commerce Act 2006 to ensure that the system is reliable to attribute the electronic signatures to the contracting parties; (2) once the print-out of a smart tenancy is stamped, the tenant and landlord have an option to apply for endorsement of tenancy with the land registry under the National Land Code (Revised 2020); (3) the Legal Profession Act 1976 does not restrict the marketing, operation and maintenance of smart tenancies services to be done by law firms exclusively; and (4) there is no room for self-help eviction of a tenant in Malaysia, and the eviction process ought to be enforced with a court order.
【Abstract】Fake news is undoubtedly a significant threat to democratic countries nowadays because existing technologies can quickly and massively produce fake videos, articles, or social media messages based on the rapid development of artificial intelligence and deep learning. Therefore, human assistance is critical if current fake news prevention systems desire to improve accuracy. Given this situation, prior research has proposed to add a quorum, a group of appraisers trusted by users to verify the authenticity of digital content, to the fake news prevention systems. This paper proposes an entropy-based incentive mechanism to diminish the negative effect of malicious behaviors on a quorum-based fake news prevention system. In order to maintain the Safety and Liveness of our system, we employed entropy to measure the degree of voting disagreement to determine appropriate rewards and penalties. To the best of our knowledge, we believe this is the first proposed work to leverage entropy in a fake news prevention system. Moreover, we use Hyperledger Fabric, Schnorr signatures, and human appraisers to implement a practical prototype of a quorum-based fake news prevention system. Then we conduct necessary case analyses and experiments to realize how dishonest participants, crash failures, and scale impact our system. The outcomes of the case analyses and experiments show that our mechanisms are feasible and provide an analytical basis for developing fake news prevention systems. Furthermore, we have added six innovative contributions in this extension work compared to our previous workshop paper in DEVIANCE 2021.
