Keynote Talk II: Economically-efficient attacks on blockchains

Abstract

For better or worse, blockchain systems have become an integral part of our financial infrastructure. While cryptocurrencies have seen limited adoption as a way to pay for goods and services (with the exception of underground marketplaceS), they have become a mainstream investment instrument. Given the amount of money transiting everyday over modern blockchains, like Bitcoin's or Ethereum's, ensuring security of these systems is of paramount importance. Unfortunately, as I will discuss in this talk, fairly simple economic attacks can be particularly harmful to the ecosystem as a whole. I will in particular introduce Blockchain Amplification Attacks, in which attackers can cause serious financial losses to infrastructure operators (e.g., those operating relay nodes), and Blockchain Address Poisoning attacks, which have become an extremely common way of swindling end-users of their money. I will also introduce some possible defenses, or at least counter-measures against these attacks.