Survey of Blockchain Applications in Database Security

Blockchain is an implementation of distributed computing which provides decentralized solutions for systems that work in a centrally governed manner. It provides services such as smart contracts to establish consensus, immutability of data and decentralization of data. Due to these services that blockchain puts to the floor, it becomes a viable option for the data storage systems that thrive for security, privacy and confidentiality in an automated and decentralized manner. This paper investigates the current state of research in the field of blockchain as a service in providing security to databases. Five major types of data storage implementations which include blockchain as a tool to provide security solutions are discussed in this paper. Comparison studies of these implementations are done with respect to the security solutions provided. Further, some research questions are discussed which need to be addressed.