In this work, we propose a concrete example of such a mechanism which is using collateralized smart contracts. Our approach allows miners to bypass non-outsourceable Proof-of-Work schemes if the underlying blockchain platform supports smart contracts in a sufficiently advanced language. In particular, the language should allow access to the PoW solution.
At a high level, our approach requires the miner to lock collateral covering the reward amount and protected by a smart contract that acts as an escrow. The smart contract has logic that allows the pool to collect the collateral as soon as the miner collects any block reward. We propose two variants of the approach depending on when the collateral is bound to the block solution. Using this, we show how to bypass previously proposed non-outsourceable Proof-of-Work schemes (with the notable exception for strong non-outsourceable schemes) and show how to build mining pools for such schemes.
Category / Keywords: applications / blockchain, proof-of-work, proof-of-work, smart contracts, non-outsourceable proof-of-work Original Publication (in the same form): 4th Workshop on Trusted Smart Contracts in Association with Financial Cryptography 2020 Date: received 15 Jan 2020 Contact author: kushti at protonmail ch Available format(s): PDF | BibTeX Citation Version: 20200117:082447 (All versions of this report) Short URL: ia.cr/2020/044