Proof-of-work system

Service (business)

Service provider

Microeconomics

Computer security

Convergence (economics)

Operating system

Telecommunications

Economics

Blockchain

Computer science

Cloud computing

Mathematical optimization

Distributed computing

Computer network

Mathematics

Political science

Enhanced Data Rates for GSM Evolution

Nash equilibrium

Economy

Game theory

Economic growth

Edge computing

Lease

IEEE Transactions on Services Computing

The mining process in public blockchains with the Nakamoto consensus protocol requires solving a computational puzzle, i.e., proof-of-work, which is resource expensive to implement in lightweight devices with limited computing resources and energy. Thus, renting mining service from cloud providers becomes a reasonable solution, which is called cloud mining. This enables users who want to mine, i.e., miners, to purchase and lease an amount of hashing power from the cloud/edge providers without any hassle of managing the infrastructure. In this paper, we study the interactions among the cloud/edge providers and miners in blockchain using a multi-leader multi-follower game-theoretic approach, in order to support proof-of-work based blockchains application. Due to the inherent complexity of the formulated game, we employ the Alternating Direction Method of Multipliers (ADMM) algorithm to investigate the optimum solution. Utilizing the decomposition characteristics and fast convergence of ADMM, we obtain the optimum results in a distributed manner. Simulation results demonstrate that with the proposed solutions, the optimization of the utilities of miners and the profits of providers can be jointly achieved.

Cloud/Edge Computing Service Management in Blockchain Networks: Multi-leader Multi-follower Game-based ADMM for Pricing