Blockchain Data Indexing via Erasure Coding
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Solution Overview
Problem
Distributed ledger systems (DLSs) face challenges in efficiently storing and retrieving blockchain data due to large storage requirements and data inequality among nodes, leading to potential data security risks and resource inefficiencies.
Innovation Solution
The method involves generating encoded blocks using error correction coding (ECC), dividing them into datasets, and indexing these datasets across multiple blockchain nodes, allowing for efficient storage and retrieval while ensuring data integrity and security by verifying hash values.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If every node stores an entire copy of the blockchain, then data completeness and availability are improved, but storage space consumption and system resource usage increase significantly
Solution Approach 1:
The patent divides the blockchain data into multiple segments (chunks) and distributes them across different nodes using erasure coding. Each node stores only a portion of the data rather than the complete blockchain, reducing storage requirements while maintaining data availability through distributed storage.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent creates redundant copies of data segments across multiple nodes using erasure coding schemes. This allows any single node to reconstruct the complete blockchain data by combining segments from multiple sources, ensuring data completeness without requiring every node to store the entire chain.
2Volume of stationary object
If a few shared nodes store the entire copy of the blockchain, then storage space is saved, but data security risk increases when majority of nodes are at fault
Solution Approach 1:
The patent implements differential storage strategies where different nodes store different portions of the blockchain data based on their roles and capabilities. This ensures that no single node or small group of nodes holds the majority of data, distributing security risks across the entire network while optimizing storage usage.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent applies erasure coding to create redundant data representations before storage. This beforehand cushioning ensures that even if multiple nodes fail or are compromised, the data can be reconstructed from remaining valid segments, maintaining data security and availability under fault conditions.
3Volume of stationary object
If blockchain data is stored without encoding, then storage efficiency is improved, but data recovery capability when nodes are faulty deteriorates
Solution Approach 1:
The patent converts the overhead of data encoding into a beneficial feature by using erasure coding to create self-healing data structures. The encoding process adds redundancy that enables automatic data recovery and correction, transforming what would be considered unnecessary overhead into a protective mechanism that improves data reliability and recovery capabilities.
Data Source
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AI summary
Disclosed herein are methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media for indexing blockchain data for storage. One of the methods includes generating a plurality of encoded blocks based on performing error correction coding (ECC) on a plurality of blocks of a blockchain; for each encoded block of the plurality of encoded blocks: dividing the encoded block into a plurality of datasets based on a data storage scheme associated with the plurality of blocks, wherein the data storage scheme provides assignments of the plurality of datasets to a plurality of blockchain nodes; storing at least one of the plurality of datasets based on the assignments provided in the data storage scheme; and providing an index that indexes each of the plurality of datasets to each of the plurality of the blockchain nodes at which a respective dataset is stored.