Internet of Things and Blockchain Integration: Use Cases and Implementation Challenges

Abstract

Research on blockchain (BC) and Internet of things (IoT) shows that they can be more powerful when combined or integrated together. However, the technologies are still emerging and face a lot of challenges. The paper focuses on Internet of things integration with the blockchain technology. We reviewed these technologies and identified some use cases of their combination and key issues hindering their integration. These issues are scalability, interoperability, inefficiencies, security, governance and regulation. While these issues are inherent in the current generations of blockchain such as Bitcoin and Ethereum respectively, with a well-designed architecture, the majority of these issues can be solved in the future generation. This work is inspired by the rapid growth in the number of connected devices and the volume of data produced by these devices and the need for security, efficient storage and processing.