Ripple: Overview and outlook

Frederik Armknecht, Ghassan O. Karame, Avikarsha Mandal, Franck Youssef, Erik Zenner

    Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

    Abstract

    Ripple is a payment system and a digital currency which evolved completely independently of Bitcoin. Although Ripple holds the second highest market cap after Bitcoin, there are surprisingly no studies which analyze the provisions of Ripple. In this paper, we study the current deployment of the Ripple payment system. For that purpose, we overview the Ripple protocol and outline its security and privacy provisions in relation to the Bitcoin system. We also discuss the consensus protocol of Ripple. Contrary to the statement of the Ripple designers, we show that the current choice of parameters does not prevent the occurrence of forks in the system. To remedy this problem, we give a necessary and sufficient condition to prevent any fork in the system. Finally, we analyze the current usage patterns and trade dynamics in Ripple by extracting information from the Ripple global ledger. As far as we are aware, this is the first contribution which sheds light on the current deployment of the Ripple system.

    Original languageEnglish
    Title of host publicationTrust and Trustworthy Computing - 8th International Conference, TRUST 2015, Proceedings
    PublisherSpringer Verlag
    Pages163-180
    Number of pages18
    Volume9229
    ISBN (Print)9783319228457
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2015
    Event8th International Conference on Trust and Trustworthy Computing, TRUST 2015 - Heraklion, Greece
    Duration: 24 Aug 201526 Aug 2015

    Publication series

    NameLecture Notes in Computer Science (including subseries Lecture Notes in Artificial Intelligence and Lecture Notes in Bioinformatics)
    Volume9229
    ISSN (Print)0302-9743
    ISSN (Electronic)1611-3349

    Other

    Other8th International Conference on Trust and Trustworthy Computing, TRUST 2015
    Country/TerritoryGreece
    CityHeraklion
    Period24/08/1526/08/15

    Keywords

    • Bitcoin
    • Forks
    • Ripple
    • Security

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