The blockchain emerges as an innovative tool which proves to be useful in a number of application scenarios. A number of large industrial players, such as IBM, Microsoft, Intel, and NEC, are currently investing in exploiting the blockchain in order to enrich their portfolio of products. A number of researchers and practitioners speculate that the blockchain technology can change the way we see a number of online applications today. Although it is still early to tell for sure, it is expected that the blockchain will stimulate considerable changes to a large number of products and will positively impact the digital experience of many individuals around the globe. In this talk, Dr. Karame will recap the basic security provisions of existing permissionless blockchain technologies and will overview state of the art consensus technologies, such as Proof of Stake and Byzantine Fault Tolerant algorithms, for next-generation blockchains.
