Shyamsunder Manaktala,
Rakesh Saxena,
Deepak Sankhla,
Aashish Kumar Sharma,
Rakesh Kumar Kardam,
- Professor, Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, JECRC University, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
- Professor, Faculty of Computer Engineering, Poornima University, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
- Assistant Professor, Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, JECRC University, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
- Assistant Professor, Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, JECRC University, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
- Assistant Professor, Department of Electronics and Communication Engineering, JECRC University, Jaipur, Rajasthan, India
Abstract
Blockchain technology has emerged as a foundational distributed-ledger architecture enabling decentralized, transparent, and tamper-resistant data management across diverse digital ecosystems. This paper presents an integrated review of blockchain fundamentals, consensus mechanisms, smart contract design, and real-world applications beyond cryptocurrencies. It discusses the evolution of smart contracts as automated, self-executing programs that remove intermediaries and ensure deterministic execution, while highlighting critical security vulnerabilities such as reentrancy, arithmetic overflows, and improper access control. This paper judges the need for organized audits, verifies prominent open-source analysis tools—including Slither, Mythril, Securify, and Oyente—and outlines a structured auditing workflow combining static, dynamic, and formal verification techniques. Also, evaluates Broader industry challenges, such as scalability constraints, interoperability gaps, regulatory uncertainty, and the emerging quantum-computing threat, are analyzed to assess the long-term viability of blockchain systems. The study concludes with future research directions emphasizing post-quantum cryptography, cross-chain frameworks, advanced consensus models, and integration of blockchain with AI and IoT to build resilient next-generation decentralized infrastructures.
Keywords: Blockchain, smart contracts, security audits, vulnerability analysis, distributed ledger, consensus mechanisms, decentralized finance (DeFi), post-quantum cryptography, interoperability, Ethereum, static analysis tools, slither, Mythril, scalability, quantum computing threat
[This article belongs to Journal of Open Source Developments ]
References
- Nakamoto S. Bitcoin: A peer-to-peer electronic cash system [white paper]. 2008. Available from: https://bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
- Buterin V. Ethereum: A next-generation smart contract and decentralized application platform [white paper]. 2014. Available from: https://ethereum.org/whitepaper/
- Crosby M, Nachiappan, Pattanayak P, Verma S, Kalyanaraman V. Blockchain technology: Beyond Bitcoin. Appl Innov Rev. 2016 Jun;(2):6–19.
- Luu L, Chu DH, Olickel H, Saxena P, Hobor A. Making Smart Contracts Smarter. CCS ’16: Proceedings of the 2016 ACM SIGSAC Conference on Computer and Communications Security, Vienna, Austria, 2016. p. 254–269. doi:10.1145/2976749.2978309.
- Atzei N, Bartoletti M, Cimoli T. A survey of attacks on Ethereum smart contracts (SoK). In: Principles of Security and Trust; 2017. p. 164–186. doi:10.1007/978-3-662-54455-6_8.
- Yaish A, Stern G, Zohar A. Uncle Maker: (Time)Stamping Out the Competition in Ethereum. In: Proceedings of the 2023 ACM SIGSAC Conference on Computer and Communications Security, Copenhagen, Denmark. 2023. p. 1614–1628. doi:10.1145/3576915.3616674.
- Gamage HTM, Weerasinghe HD, Dias NGJ. A survey on blockchain technology concepts, applications, and issues. SN Comput Sci. 2020;1(2):114. doi:10.1007/s42979-020-00123-0.
- Wang X, He J, Xie Z, Zhao G, Cheung SC. ContractGuard: Defend Ethereum Smart Contracts with Embedded Intrusion Detection. IEEE Trans Serv Comput. 2020;13(2):314–328. doi:10.1109/TSC.2019.2949561.
- Tsankov P, Dan A, Drachsler-Cohen D, Gervais A, Buenzli F, Vechev M. Securify: Practical Security Analysis of Smart Contracts. In: Proceedings of the 2018 ACM SIGSAC Conference on Computer and Communications Security, Toronto, ON, Canada. 2018. p. 67–82. doi:10.1145/3243734.3243780.
- Sidhu J. Syscoin: A peer-to-peer electronic cash system with blockchain-based services for e-business. ICCCN: 2017 26th International Conference on Computer Communication and Networks, Vancouver, Canada, 2017. p. 1–6. doi:10.1109/ICCCN.2017.8038518.
Journal of Open Source Developments
| Volume | 13 | |
| Issue | 01 | |
| Received | 03/02/2026 | |
| Accepted | 18/04/2026 | |
| Published | 30/04/2026 | |
| Publication Time | 86 Days |