FMBC 2020

2nd Workshop on Formal Methods for Blockchains

July 20-21, 2020, online

Co-located with the 32nd International Conference on Computer-Aided Verification (CAV 2020)

Registration here before July 10! (Choose FMBC at the end of the form.) Registration is free but required.

Overview

Blockchains are decentralised transactional ledgers that rely on cryptographic hash functions for guaranteeing the integrity of the stored data. Participants on the network reach agreement on what valid transactions are through consensus algorithms.

Blockchains may also provide support for Smart Contracts. Smart Contracts are scripts of an ad-hoc programming language that are stored in the blockchain and that run on the network. They can interact with the ledger’s data and update its state. These scripts can express the logic of possibly complex contracts between users of the blockchain. Thus, Smart Contracts can facilitate the economic activity of blockchain participants.

With the emergence and increasing popularity of cryptocurrencies such as Bitcoin and Ethereum, it is now of utmost importance to have strong guarantees of the behaviour of blockchain software. These guarantees can be brought by using Formal Methods. Indeed, Blockchain software encompasses many topics of computer science where using Formal Methods techniques and tools is relevant: consensus algorithms to ensure the liveness and the security of the data on the chain, programming languages specifically designed to write smart contracts, cryptographic protocols, such as zero-knowledge proofs, used to ensure privacy, etc.

Scope and Topics

This workshop is a forum to identify theoretical and practical approaches of formal methods for blockchain technology. Topics include, but are not limited to:

Invited Speaker

Grigore Rosu, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA

Proceedings

Proceedings of the workshop were published in Volume 84 of the Dagstuhl OASIcs series.

Organisers

Feel free to contact them.

Workshop page

See also the home page of the workshop.