Published: October 07, 2017
Author(s)
Peter Mell (NIST), John Kelsey (NIST), James Shook (NIST)
Conference
Name: International Symposium on Stabilization, Safety, and Security of Distributed Systems
Dates: November 5-8, 2017
Location: Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Citation: SSS 2017: Stabilization, Safety, and Security of Distributed Systems, Lecture Notes in Computer Science vol. 10616, pp. 410-425
Most modern electronic devices can produce a random number. However, it is difficult to see how a group of mutually distrusting entities can have confidence in any such hardware-produced stream of random numbers, since the producer could control the output to their gain. In this work, we use public and immutable cryptocurrency smart contracts, along with a set of potentially malicious randomness providers, to produce a trustworthy stream of timestamped public random numbers. Our contract eliminates the ability of a producer to predict or control the generated random numbers, including the stored history of random numbers. We consider and mitigate the threat of collusion between the randomness providers and miners in a second, more complex contract.
Most modern electronic devices can produce a random number. However, it is difficult to see how a group of mutually distrusting entities can have confidence in any such hardware-produced stream of random numbers, since the producer could control the output to their gain. In this work, we use public...
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Most modern electronic devices can produce a random number. However, it is difficult to see how a group of mutually distrusting entities can have confidence in any such hardware-produced stream of random numbers, since the producer could control the output to their gain. In this work, we use public and immutable cryptocurrency smart contracts, along with a set of potentially malicious randomness providers, to produce a trustworthy stream of timestamped public random numbers. Our contract eliminates the ability of a producer to predict or control the generated random numbers, including the stored history of random numbers. We consider and mitigate the threat of collusion between the randomness providers and miners in a second, more complex contract.
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Keywords
beacon; blockchain; distributed consensus; randomness; smart contracts
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