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An Incentive-based Mechanism for Volunteer Computing Using Blockchain

Published:22 July 2021Publication History
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Abstract

The rise of fast communication media both at the core and at the edge has resulted in unprecedented numbers of sophisticated and intelligent wireless IoT devices. Tactile Internet has enabled the interaction between humans and machines within their environment to achieve revolutionized solutions both on the move and in real-time. Many applications such as intelligent autonomous self-driving, smart agriculture and industrial solutions, and self-learning multimedia content filtering and sharing have become attainable through cooperative, distributed, and decentralized systems, namely, volunteer computing. This article introduces a blockchain-enabled resource sharing and service composition solution through volunteer computing. Device resource, computing, and intelligence capabilities are advertised in the environment to be made discoverable and available for sharing with the aid of blockchain technology. Incentives in the form of on-demand service availability are given to resource and service providers to ensure fair and balanced cooperative resource usage. Blockchains are formed whenever a service request is initiated with the aid of fog and mobile edge computing (MEC) devices to ensure secure communication and service delivery for the participants. Using both volunteer computing techniques and tactile internet architectures, we devise a fast and reliable service provisioning framework that relies on a reinforcement learning technique. Simulation results show that the proposed solution can achieve high reward distribution, increased number of blockchain formations, reduced delays, and balanced resource usage among participants, under the premise of high IoT device availability.

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      • Published in

        cover image ACM Transactions on Internet Technology
        ACM Transactions on Internet Technology  Volume 21, Issue 4
        November 2021
        520 pages
        ISSN:1533-5399
        EISSN:1557-6051
        DOI:10.1145/3472282
        • Editor:
        • Ling Lu
        Issue’s Table of Contents

        Copyright © 2021 Association for Computing Machinery.

        Publisher

        Association for Computing Machinery

        New York, NY, United States

        Publication History

        • Published: 22 July 2021
        • Revised: 1 August 2020
        • Accepted: 1 August 2020
        • Received: 1 June 2020
        Published in toit Volume 21, Issue 4

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