# Blockchain for Future Wireless Networks: A Decade Survey
###### Abstract  
The emerging need for high data rate, low latency, and high network capacity encourages wireless networks (WNs) to build intelligent and dynamic services, such as intelligent transportation systems, smart homes, smart cities, industrial automation, etc. However, the WN is impeded by several security threats, such as data manipulation, denial-of-service, injection, man-in-the-middle, session hijacking attacks, etc., that deteriorate the security performance of the aforementioned WN-based intelligent services. Toward this goal, various security solutions, such as cryptography, artificial intelligence (AI), access control, authentication, etc., are proposed by the scientific community around the world; however, they do not have full potential in tackling the aforementioned security issues. Therefore, it necessitates a technology, i.e., a blockchain, that offers decentralization, immutability, transparency, and security to protect the WN from security threats. Motivated by these facts, this paper presents a WNs survey in the context of security and privacy issues with blockchain-based solutions. First, we analyzed the existing research works and highlighted security requirements, security issues in a different generation of WN (4G, 5G, and 6G), and a comparative analysis of existing security solutions. Then, we showcased the influence of blockchain technology and prepared an exhaustive taxonomy for blockchain-enabled security solutions in WN. Further, we also proposed a blockchain and a 6G-based WN architecture to highlight the importance of blockchain technology in WN. Moreover, the proposed architecture is evaluated against different performance metrics, such as scalability, packet loss ratio, and latency. Finally, we discuss various open issues and research challenges for blockchain-based WNs solutions. wireless networks; security; privacy; blockchain; distributed ledger technology +
Footnote †: journal: _Sensors_  
issues, the scientific community has adopted effective radio resource management and modern technology, such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, quantum communication, etc., that offers better network performance in every next-generation wireless network. Figure 1 shows the evolution of wireless communication technologies that started in the late 1970s. It took almost 50 years for WNs to evolve from the 1 st generation to the 5 th generation to deliver a progressive quality of services (QoS) to an individual and the nation's capital economy [3; 4]. The first generation (IG) WN introduced in 1979 was meant to initiate voice communication between individuals using analog signals. Unfortunately, the success of 1G was quelled due to its several limitations, i.e., poor voice quality, high battery consumption, prone to security attacks, and limited capacity. Moreover, an adversary can perform clone and masquerade attacks and easily intercept the communications between two parties [5]. To mitigate the aforementioned problems in 1G, second generation (2G) introduced digital communication, such as a global system for mobile communication (GSM) and general packet radio services (GPRS). It offers features such as text and multimedia messages and data services with a transfer rate of 40 kbits/s. Additionally, it enhances the reliability of the 2G systems by providing error detection, and correction mechanisms [6]. However, with the internet services and multimedia platform, 2G does not facilitate satisfactory data transmission rates. Additionally, there are several security issues in 2G, such as illegal interception, message spamming, and false information injection. Hence, it is recommended by many technology makers and innovators to stop using 2G systems. To overcome the limitations of the 2G system, the third generation partnership project (3 GPP) has deployed third generation (3G) networks that came up with asymmetric and symmetric traffic, global roaming, and packet-circuit switching to enhance the performance of WNs.