Cicada: A framework for private non-interactive on-chain auctions and voting

Noemi Glaeser; István András Seres; Michael Zhu; Joseph Bonneau

Paper 2023/1473

Cicada: A framework for private non-interactive on-chain auctions and voting

Noemi Glaeser

, University of Maryland, College Park, Max Planck Institute for Security and Privacy

István András Seres

, Eötvös Loránd University

Michael Zhu, a16z crypto research

Joseph Bonneau, a16z crypto research, New York University

Abstract

Auction and voting schemes play a crucial role in the Web3 ecosystem. Yet currently deployed implementations either lack privacy or require at least two rounds, hindering usability and security. We introduce Cicada, a general framework for using linearly homomorphic time-lock puzzles (HTLPs) to enable provably secure, non-interactive private auction and voting protocols. We instantiate our framework with an efficient new HTLP construction and novel packing techniques that enable succinct ballot correctness proofs independent of the number of candidates. We demonstrate the practicality of our approach by implementing our protocols for the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM).

Note: Update and expand plots

Metadata

Available format(s): PDF
Category: Cryptographic protocols
Publication info: Preprint.
Keywords: auction e-voting homomorphic time-lock puzzle blockchain
Contact author(s): nglaeser @ umd edu
seresistvanandras @ gmail com
mzhu @ a16z com
jbonneau @ gmail com
History: 2024-03-14: last of 3 revisions; 2023-09-25: received; See all versions
Short URL: https://ia.cr/2023/1473
License: CC BY

BibTeX

@misc{cryptoeprint:2023/1473,
      author = {Noemi Glaeser and István András Seres and Michael Zhu and Joseph Bonneau},
      title = {Cicada: A framework for private non-interactive on-chain auctions and voting},
      howpublished = {Cryptology ePrint Archive, Paper 2023/1473},
      year = {2023},
      note = {\url{https://eprint.iacr.org/2023/1473}},
      url = {https://eprint.iacr.org/2023/1473}
}