The classification of blockchain-based application: A literature review.
By: Regina Nkemchor Adejo
Tags: Blockchain, Blockchain Technology, Blockchain Application

Image Source: Bing Search Blockchain Images

Abstract

Blockchain systems are public electronic ledgers built around a peer-to-peer network that is publicly shared among different actors to create an unchangeable transaction record. Blockchain technology’s primary use is for distributed ledger for cryptocurrencies, notably bitcoin. Over the years, Blockchain has expanded its application area, such as smart contracts, financial services, video games, energy trading, supply chain, health care, etc. The concept of blockchain technology has been discussed extensively in different literature works, yet information regarding Blockchain-based application classification remains scarce.

This study provides a systematic review of previous studies on Blockchain technology and applications. I discussed an overview of Blockchain and the classification of blockchain-enabled applications across diverse sectors such as financial applications, education, integrity verification, governance, and data management. This research can be useful to blockchain-technology researchers and can help further studies and future development.

Keywords: Blockchain technology; Blockchain; Blockchain application; Blockchain classification

1 Introduction

Many years ago, Satoshi Nakamoto, the unknown person/group behind Bitcoin, described how blockchain technology, a distributed peer-to-peer linked-structure, could solve the arrangement of keeping transactions from having a double-spending problem (Nakamoto, 2008). Bitcoin arranges transactions and groups them in a constrained-size structure named blocks sharing the same time-stamp. The network (miners) nodes use blocks to link each other in chronological order, with every block having the hash of the previous block to create a blockchain (Crosby et al., 2016).

Blockchain technology brought about disruptions to the traditional way of doing business. The applications and transactions, which required centralized architectures and trusted third parties to verify them, can now function in a decentralized manner and with the same accuracy level. Blockchain architecture and design characteristics provide properties like transparency, robustness, audit, and security (Christidis and Devetsikiotis, 2016).

A blockchain is a distributed database organized as a list of ordered blocks, where the committed blocks are immutable. For instance, in the ideal banking sector, banks can cooperate under the same Blockchain and push their customers’ transactions. This way, beyond transparency, Blockchain enables transactions’ auditing. Organizations invest in this technology as they see the potential of making their architectures decentralized and minimizing their transaction costs as they become inherently safer, transparent, and in some cases, faster. For this reason, Blockchain technology is becoming increasingly important (Zhao et al., 2016). Almost 1000 (33%) of C-suite executives reveal that they are considering or have already been actively busy with blockchain technology. According to Christidis and Devetsikiotis, 2016 researchers and developers are already mindful of the new technology’s capabilities and investigate various applications over different divisions based on the intended readers. While there are several analyses regarding blockchain technology (Tama et al., 2017; Brand. o et al., 2018), they argue that state-of-the-art blockchain-enabled applications have received limited attention. Even in Zheng et al. (2016), blockchains’ applications have not fully covered their full extent or applicability. Some reviews focused on Blockchain’s particular role, including developing decentralized and data-driven applications for the IOT (Christidis and Devetsikiotis, 2016) and working with big data in a decentralized fashion. Other reviews concentrated on the security problems of the Blockchain and on its potential to enable trust and decentralization in in-service platforms (Seebacher et al., 2017) and Peer to peer systems (Hawlitschek et al., 2018).

However, even though there are several works of literature on Blockchain’s different aspects, there is still not enough research to show the classification of blockchain-enabled applications. Hence, by studying existing literature, I highlight the question: What are the types of Blockchain-based applications? In answering this question, I contribute towards understanding the Blockchain, its features, and taxonomy. The rest of the paper’s structure is in sections: Section 2 presents an overview of Blockchain. In section 3, I outline the method followed in conducting the systematic literature review. The findings was presented in Section 4, while in Section 5, I present the discussion on the articles reviewed. After that, I give my conclusion.