Mr Samuel Onalo

Research project: Virtual Private Blockchains

Abstract

Blockchain technology, while maturing, is still lacking features that would be considered indispensable in real-world business applications. In particular, the lack of transaction confidentiality in a public blockchain is a challenging problem. In this paper, the concept of aVirtual Private Blockchain (VPBC) is proposed as a mechanism to create a blockchain architecture with properties akin to those of a private blockchain, however leveraging existing public blockchain functionality. A VPBC can be set up between individuals or organisations, does not require any significant administrative maintenance, inherits all the functionality from the public blockchain, and achieves anonymity and transaction confidentiality with respect to any public blockchain node who does not belong to the VPBC. Building on this theoretical concept, it is then shown how the cryptographic technique of secret sharing can be used in order to implement a simple VPBC architecture. A proof-of-concept architecture has been created and early experiments indicatethat the creation of VPBCs for potential real-world applicationscenarios might be feasible.

  • Research degree: PhD
  • Title of project: Virtual Private Blockchains
  • Research supervisor: Dr Eckhard Pfluegel

Biography

Mr. Samuel Onalo has a diverse work history. He has a wide range of interests and as result, has worked in different sectors, including Instrumentation Engineering, Logistics and Project Management, Education and Pedagogy Enhancement, Music Technoology, Business Process Management, and Cyber Security Research. He is currently working as a graduate intern with the Technology Enhanced Learning team of the Teaching and Learning Enhancement Department of Kingston University London.

Areas of research interest

  • Developement and Application of Decentratised Distributed Ledger Technology Architecture for Network and Information Security.
  • The Future of Cryptocurrencies and other Decentralised Distributed Digital Financial Instruments.

Qualifications

  • BSc in Applied Physics, Kogi State University Nigeria.
  • MSc in Network and Information Security with Business Management, Kingston University London.

Funding or awards received

  • Virtual Private Blockchains: Security Overlays for Permissioned Blockchains published at the CYBER 2020 Conference, Nice, France.
  • Virtual Private Blockchains: Security Overlays for Permissioned Blockchains, awarded one of the top Best five papers published at the Cyber 2020 Conference Nice, France - https://www.iaria.org/conferences2020/AwardsCYBER20.html

Publications

Virtual Private Blockchains: Security Overlays for Permissioned Blokchains - http://www.thinkmind.org/index.php?view=article&articleid=cyber_2020_2_70_80064

https://www.iaria.org/conferences2020/awardsCYBER20/cyber2020_a5.pdf

Number of items: 2.

Conference or Workshop Item

Miah, Foysal, Onalo, Samuel and Pfluegel, Eckhard (2021) Transforming Higher Education systems architectures through adoption of secure overlay blockchain technologies. In: VIRTUAL 13th International Conference on Global Security, Safety & Sustainability Cyber Security, Privacy and Freedom Protection in the Connected World; 14 - 15 Jan 2021, Newcastle, U.K. (Held online).

Onalo, Samuel, Gc, Deepak and Pfluegel, Eckhard (2020) Virtual private blockchains : security overlays for permissioned blockchains. In: Fifth International Conference on Cyber-Technologies and Cyber-Systems : CYBER 2020; 25 - 29 Oct 2020, Nice, France.

This list was generated on Thu Apr 25 06:07:00 2024 BST.

Conference papers

Virtual Private Blockchains: Security Overlays for Permissioned Blokchains - http://www.thinkmind.org/index.php?view=article&articleid=cyber_2020_2_70_80064