{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2026,6,2]],"date-time":"2026-06-02T21:12:52Z","timestamp":1780434772919,"version":"3.54.1"},"reference-count":50,"publisher":"MDPI AG","issue":"12","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2020,12,6]],"date-time":"2020-12-06T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1607212800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/creativecommons.org\/licenses\/by\/4.0\/"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":["Information"],"abstract":"<jats:p>With the advent of Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) technologies, the networking infrastructures are becoming increasingly agile in their attempts to offer the quality of services needed by the users, maximizing the efficiency of infrastructure utilization. This in essence mandates the statistical multiplexing of demands across the infrastructures of different Network Providers (NPs), which would allow them to cope with the increasing demand, upgrading their infrastructures at a slower pace. However, to enjoy the benefits of statistical multiplexing, a trusted authority to govern it would be required. At the same time, blockchain technology aspires to offer a solid advantage in such untrusted environments, enabling the development of decentralized solutions that ensure the integrity and immutability of the information stored in the digital ledger. To this end, in this paper, we propose a blockchain-based solution that allows NPs to trade their (processing and networking) resources. We implemented the solution in a test-bed deployed on the cloud and we present the gathered performance results, showing that a blockchain-based solution is feasible and appropriate. We also discuss further improvements and challenges.<\/jats:p>","DOI":"10.3390\/info11120570","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2020,12,6]],"date-time":"2020-12-06T22:27:12Z","timestamp":1607293632000},"page":"570","update-policy":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/mdpi_crossmark_policy","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":27,"title":["Application of Blockchain Technology in Dynamic Resource Management of Next Generation Networks"],"prefix":"10.3390","volume":"11","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-4630-1082","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Michael","family":"Xevgenis","sequence":"first","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Industrial Design and Production Engineering, University of West Attica, 122 43 Attica, Greece"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Dimitrios G.","family":"Kogias","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, University of West Attica, 122 43 Attica, Greece"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0003-4971-826X","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Panagiotis","family":"Karkazis","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Information and Computer Engineering, University of West Attica, 122 43 Attica, Greece"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1489-1495","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Helen C.","family":"Leligou","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Industrial Design and Production Engineering, University of West Attica, 122 43 Attica, Greece"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]},{"given":"Charalampos","family":"Patrikakis","sequence":"additional","affiliation":[{"name":"Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, University of West Attica, 122 43 Attica, Greece"}],"role":[{"vocabulary":"crossref","role":"author"}]}],"member":"1968","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,12,6]]},"reference":[{"key":"ref_1","unstructured":"(2019, December 14). OSM MANO. Available online: https:\/\/osm.etsi.org\/."},{"key":"ref_2","unstructured":"(2020, January 09). ONAP. Available online: https:\/\/www.onap.org\/."},{"key":"ref_3","unstructured":"(2020, January 09). SONATA. Available online: https:\/\/www.sonata-nfv.eu\/."},{"key":"ref_4","first-page":"118","article-title":"A survey on blockchain technologies and research","volume":"14","author":"Tavares","year":"2019","journal-title":"J. Inf."},{"key":"ref_5","first-page":"1","article-title":"A Survey of Blockchain-Based Strategies for Healthcare","volume":"53","author":"Krishnamachari","year":"2020","journal-title":"ACM Comput. Surv."},{"key":"ref_6","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"117134","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2019.2936094","article-title":"A Survey of Blockchain From the Perspectives of Applications, Challenges, and Opportunities","volume":"7","author":"Monrat","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_7","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"2794","DOI":"10.1109\/COMST.2019.2899617","article-title":"A Survey of Blockchain Technology Applied to Smart Cities: Research Issues and Challenges","volume":"21","author":"Xie","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Surv. Tutor."},{"key":"ref_8","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"10","DOI":"10.1016\/j.comcom.2019.01.006","article-title":"Survey on blockchain for Internet of Things","volume":"136","author":"Wang","year":"2019","journal-title":"Comput. Commun."},{"key":"ref_9","unstructured":"Xevgenis, M., Dimitrios, G., and Patrikakis, C.Z. (2020, November 20). A Survey on the Available Blockchain Platforms and Protocols for Supply Chain Management. Available online: http:\/\/ceur-ws.org\/Vol-2686\/paper4.pdf."},{"key":"ref_10","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"62018","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2018.2875782","article-title":"Blockchain in Logistics and Supply Chain: A Lean Approach for Designing Real-World Use Cases","volume":"6","author":"Perboli","year":"2018","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_11","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"80","DOI":"10.1016\/j.ijinfomgt.2017.12.005","article-title":"1 Blockchain\u2019s roles in meeting key supply chain management objectives","volume":"39","author":"Kshetri","year":"2018","journal-title":"Int. J. Inf. Manag."},{"key":"ref_12","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"50","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jsis.2018.10.002","article-title":"Affordances, experimentation and actualization of FinTech: A blockchain implementation study","volume":"28","author":"Du","year":"2019","journal-title":"J. Strat. Inf. Syst."},{"key":"ref_13","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Fernandez-Vazquez, S., Rosillo, R., De La Fuente, D., and Priore, P. (2019). Blockchain in FinTech: A Mapping Study. Sustainability, 11.","DOI":"10.3390\/su11226366"},{"key":"ref_14","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Chaer, A., Salah, K., Lima, C., Ray, P.P., and Sheltami, T. (2019, January 9\u201313). Blockchain for 5G: Opportunities and Challenges. Proceedings of the 2019 IEEE Globecom Workshops (GC Wkshps), Waikoloa, HI, USA.","DOI":"10.1109\/GCWkshps45667.2019.9024627"},{"key":"ref_15","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"115876","DOI":"10.1109\/ACCESS.2020.3003020","article-title":"A Review on Application of Blockchain in 5G and Beyond Networks: Taxonomy, Field-Trials, Challenges and Opportunities","volume":"8","author":"Tahir","year":"2020","journal-title":"IEEE Access"},{"key":"ref_16","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"102693","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jnca.2020.102693","article-title":"Blockchain for 5G and beyond networks: A state of the art survey","volume":"166","author":"Nguyen","year":"2020","journal-title":"J. Netw. Comput. Appl."},{"key":"ref_17","unstructured":"(2020, February 10). Quorum. Available online: https:\/\/docs.goquorum.consensys.net\/en\/latest\/."},{"key":"ref_18","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"433","DOI":"10.1109\/TNET.2018.2890631","article-title":"VNF Placement and Resource Allocation for the Support of Vertical Services in 5G Networks","volume":"27","author":"Agarwal","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE\/ACM Trans. Netw."},{"key":"ref_19","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"242","DOI":"10.1109\/MNET.2018.1800267","article-title":"On Multi-Domain Network Slicing Orchestration Architecture and Federated Resource Control","volume":"33","author":"Taleb","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE Netw."},{"key":"ref_20","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"32","DOI":"10.1109\/MCOM.2016.7514161","article-title":"From network sharing to multi-tenancy: The 5G network slice broker","volume":"54","author":"Samdanis","year":"2016","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Mag."},{"key":"ref_21","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Wright, C.S. (2008). Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System. SSRN Electron. J.","DOI":"10.2139\/ssrn.3440802"},{"key":"ref_22","unstructured":"(2019, December 14). IBM Food Trust. Available online: https:\/\/www.ibm.com\/blockchain\/solutions\/food-trust."},{"key":"ref_23","unstructured":"(2019, December 14). TradeLens. Available online: https:\/\/www.tradelens.com\/."},{"key":"ref_24","unstructured":"(2019, November 30). CargoX. Available online: https:\/\/cargox.io\/."},{"key":"ref_25","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Mettler, M. (2016, January 14\u201316). Blockchain technology in healthcare: The revolution starts here. Proceedings of the 2016 IEEE 18th International Conference on e-Health Networking, Applications and Services (Healthcom), Munich, Germany.","DOI":"10.1109\/HealthCom.2016.7749510"},{"key":"ref_26","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"62","DOI":"10.1016\/j.jnca.2019.02.027","article-title":"Blockchain in healthcare applications: Research challenges and opportunities","volume":"135","author":"McGhin","year":"2019","journal-title":"J. Netw. Comput. Appl."},{"key":"ref_27","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"320","DOI":"10.1007\/s10916-019-1445-8","article-title":"A Systematic Review for Enabling of Develop a Blockchain Technology in Healthcare Application: Taxonomy, Substantially Analysis, Motivations, Challenges, Recommendations and Future Direction","volume":"43","author":"Hussien","year":"2019","journal-title":"J. Med Syst."},{"key":"ref_28","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Han, M., Li, Z., He, J. (Selena), Wu, D, Xie, Y., and Baba, A. (2018, January 3\u20136). A Novel Blockchain-based Education Records Verification Solution. Proceedings of the 19th Annual SIG Conference on Information Technology Education, Fort Lauderdale, FL, USA.","DOI":"10.1145\/3241815.3241870"},{"key":"ref_29","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Yumna, H., Khan, M.M., Ikram, M., and Ilyas, S. (2019, January 8\u201311). Use of Blockchain in Education: A Systematic Literature Review. Proceedings of the 11th Asian Conference, ACIIDS 2019, Yogyakarta, Indonesia.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-030-14802-7_17"},{"key":"ref_30","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"AlAmmary, A., Alhazmi, S., Almasri, M., and Gillani, S. (2019). Blockchain-Based Applications in Education: A Systematic Review. Appl. Sci., 9.","DOI":"10.3390\/app9122400"},{"key":"ref_31","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"18","DOI":"10.1109\/MITP.2019.2929503","article-title":"Toward a Blockchain-Enabled Crowdsourcing Platform","volume":"21","author":"Kogias","year":"2019","journal-title":"IT Prof."},{"key":"ref_32","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"1407","DOI":"10.1109\/TCSS.2019.2909137","article-title":"A Blockchain-Powered Crowdsourcing Method With Privacy Preservation in Mobile Environment","volume":"6","author":"Xu","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE Trans. Comput. Soc. Syst."},{"key":"ref_33","unstructured":"(2019, December 14). IOTA. Available online: https:\/\/www.iota.org\/."},{"key":"ref_34","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Bencic, F.M., and Zarko, I.P. (2018, January 2\u20136). Distributed Ledger Technology: Blockchain Compared to Directed Acyclic Graph. Proceedings of the 2018 IEEE 38th International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS), Vienna, Austria.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICDCS.2018.00171"},{"key":"ref_35","unstructured":"(2020, October 21). Ethereum. Available online: https:\/\/ethereum.org\/."},{"key":"ref_36","unstructured":"(2020, October 21). Hyperledger Fabric. Available online: https:\/\/www.hyperledger.org\/projects\/fabric."},{"key":"ref_37","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"70","DOI":"10.1109\/MCOM.2017.1700117","article-title":"A Model for Collaborative Blockchain-Based Video Delivery Relying on Advanced Network Services Chains","volume":"55","author":"Herbaut","year":"2017","journal-title":"IEEE Commun. Mag."},{"key":"ref_38","unstructured":"Vukoli\u0107, M. (2015, January 29). The Quest for Scalable Blockchain Fabric: Proof-of-Work vs. BFT Replication. Proceedings of the IFIP WG 11.4 International Workshop, iNetSec 2015, Zurich, Switzerland."},{"key":"ref_39","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Rebello, G.A.F., Alvarenga, I.D., Sanz, I.J., and Duarte, O.C.M.B. (2019, January 20\u201324). BSec-NFVO: A Blockchain-Based Security for Network Function Virtualization Orchestration. Proceedings of the ICC 2019\u20142019 IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC), Shanghai, China.","DOI":"10.1109\/ICC.2019.8761651"},{"key":"ref_40","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"99","DOI":"10.1109\/LNET.2019.2915117","article-title":"A Blockchain-Based Network Slice Broker for 5G Services","volume":"1","author":"Nour","year":"2019","journal-title":"IEEE Netw. Lett."},{"key":"ref_41","unstructured":"Rebello, G.A.F., Camilo, G.F., Silva, L.G.C., Guimaraes, L.C.B., De Souza, L.A.C., Alvarenga, I.D., and Duarte, O.C.M.B. (2019, January 26\u201329). Providing a Sliced, Secure, and Isolated Software Infrastructure of Virtual Functions Through Blockchain Technology. Proceedings of the 2019 IEEE 20th International Conference on High Performance Switching and Routing (HPSR), Xi\u2019an, China."},{"key":"ref_42","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Trakadas, P., Karkazis, P., Leligou, N., Zahariadis, T., Vicens, F., Zurita, A., Alemany, P., Soenen, T., Parada, C., and Bonnet, J. (2020). Comparison of Management and Orchestration Solutions for the 5G Era. J. Sens. Actuator Networks, 9.","DOI":"10.3390\/jsan9010004"},{"key":"ref_43","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Al-Hazmi, Y., Gonz\u00e1lez, J., Rodriguez-Archilla, P., \u00c1lvarez, F., Orphanoudakis, T., Karkazis, P., and Magedanz, T. (2014, January 9\u201311). Unified representation of monitoring information across federated cloud infrastructures. Proceedings of the 2014 26th International Teletraffic Congress (ITC), Karlskrona, Sweden.","DOI":"10.1109\/ITC.2014.6932978"},{"key":"ref_44","unstructured":"Theodore, Z., Panagiotis, K., Sotiris, K., and George, X. (2016, January 27\u201330). A Monitoring Framework for Heterogeneous NFV\/SDN-enabled Cloud Environments. Proceedings of the EuCNC 2016, Athens, Greece."},{"key":"ref_45","unstructured":"Panagiotis, T., Panagiotis, K., Helen-Catherine, L., Theodore, Z., Andreas, P., Wouter, T., Thomas, S., and Steven van, R. (2018, January 22\u201326). Scalable Monitoring for Multiple Virtualized Infrastructures for 5G Services. Proceedings of the ICN2018, Athens, Greece."},{"key":"ref_46","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","first-page":"106582","DOI":"10.1016\/j.compeleceng.2020.106582","article-title":"Reliability analysis for blockchain oracles","volume":"83","author":"Lo","year":"2020","journal-title":"Comput. Electr. Eng."},{"key":"ref_47","doi-asserted-by":"crossref","unstructured":"Ladleif, J., Weber, I., and Weske, M. (2020). External Data Monitoring Using Oracles in Blockchain-Based Process Execution. Proceedings of the Business Intelligence, Springer Science and Business Media LLC.","DOI":"10.1007\/978-3-030-58779-6_5"},{"key":"ref_48","unstructured":"(2020, March 22). Tessera. Available online: https:\/\/docs.tessera.consensys.net\/en\/stable\/HowTo\/Configure\/Transaction-manager\/."},{"key":"ref_49","unstructured":"(2020, August 02). Hyperledger Caliper. Available online: https:\/\/www.hyperledger.org\/learn\/publications\/blockchain-performance-metrics#."},{"key":"ref_50","unstructured":"(2020, August 22). Okeanos. Available online: https:\/\/okeanos.grnet.gr\/home\/."}],"container-title":["Information"],"original-title":[],"language":"en","link":[{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2078-2489\/11\/12\/570\/pdf","content-type":"unspecified","content-version":"vor","intended-application":"similarity-checking"}],"deposited":{"date-parts":[[2025,10,11]],"date-time":"2025-10-11T10:41:38Z","timestamp":1760179298000},"score":1,"resource":{"primary":{"URL":"https:\/\/www.mdpi.com\/2078-2489\/11\/12\/570"}},"subtitle":[],"short-title":[],"issued":{"date-parts":[[2020,12,6]]},"references-count":50,"journal-issue":{"issue":"12","published-online":{"date-parts":[[2020,12]]}},"alternative-id":["info11120570"],"URL":"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.3390\/info11120570","relation":{},"ISSN":["2078-2489"],"issn-type":[{"value":"2078-2489","type":"electronic"}],"subject":[],"published":{"date-parts":[[2020,12,6]]}}}