Tag: BFT

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Introduction to Blockchain: Consensus Algorithms – Part 1

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Why use blockchains? This question can be best answered by taking a look at the history of government. A lot of the same principles that apply to democracy, also apply to blockchains. Democracy was founded on the basis that power belongs to the people, and blockchains achieve a similar decentralization. The pillars of democracy that many of us experience every day, has not yet transferred over to technology. What is DLT? DLT stands for Distributed Ledger Technology and is one of the largest technological advancements of our time. A distributed ledger is just a database that is spread over multiple sites. This allows for more consistent uptime and the elimination for a centralized power. A blockchain is a type of distributed ledger. How does a blockchain work? The word blockchain is pretty self-explanatory. In the most literal sense, blocks are added to a chain. The addition of every following block, makes it harder to alter the original block (in order to get back to the original, every block after it would need to be removed). Each block is composed of a group of transactions that is bundled together by a node. The way that the node does this, is by […]

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History of Cryptocurrencies

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Even though cryptocurrencies are just now gaining media attention, the concepts have been around for decades. These concepts have evolved during this time period and have given rise to many cryptocurrencies, each hoping to achieve the most scalable and decentralized system. 1. DLT (Distributed Ledger Technology) DLT’s have existed for a long time and are already in use by most of the world’s largest companies. Any cloud- based system is a distributed ledger. Over time, technology has evolved from being able to store data on the cloud, to being able to have logic on the cloud. This provided countless benefits to applications such as more uptime and faster communications. 2. Consensus Algorithms While the blockchain scene was just starting out, consensus algorithms focused on PoW. But as users grew, this became more and more unscalable. The algorithms that are being used today are much more complex and incorporate other factors to find consensus. 3. BFT (Byzantine Fault Tolerance) BFT has been practice for decades and applies to any distributed system. Even space crafts such as SpaceX Dragon needed to have BFT in the design. 4. Smart Contracts Smart contracts are the future of the blockchain/cryptocurrency space. Since they were first […]

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Introduction to Blockchain: Consensus Algorithms – Part 2

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Delegated Proof-of-stake (DPOS) DPOS is the best consensus model that is currently available. It offers the fastest transaction speeds and is the most flexible and decentralized. It allows for all specifications of the network to be adjusted by “elected delegates”. There are a specified number of these “elected delegates” (also referred to as witnesses). Witnesses verify transactions by adding them to the block. Stakeholders vote on witnesses through a process that incorporates multiple rounds. If a witness were to stop doing its job properly, the stakeholders could withdraw votes and the witness would be kicked out. Stakeholders with more stake, have a larger vote. As the number of stakeholders grow, there will be more competition to be a witness. This results in a scenario where the number of witnesses are low and fixed, which increases transaction speeds. Delegated Proof-of-stake Projects 1. Ethereum (Casper): Even though Ethereum is currently POW, an extremely anticipated update is coming that will transition it to POS. BFT style proof of stake Random validators can propose blocks. Agreeing on which block to use is done through a voting process. Every validator votes on a specific block for multiple rounds. Validators agree on whether a block is […]