Blockchain-enabled Resource Management and Sharing for 6G Communications

TL;DR

This paper explores how blockchain technology can enhance resource management and sharing in 6G networks, addressing spectrum scarcity and supporting emerging applications like IoT and network slicing.

Contribution

It analyzes the potential of blockchain to improve resource management in 6G through various application scenarios, highlighting its significance for future networks.

Findings

Blockchain can enable efficient resource monitoring and sharing in 6G.

Application scenarios include IoT, device-to-device, and network slicing.

Blockchain integration can support inter-domain ecosystems.

Abstract

The sixth generation (6G) network must provide performance superior to previous generations in order to meet the requirements of emerging services and applications, such as multi-gigabit transmission rate, even higher reliability, sub 1 millisecond latency and ubiquitous connection for Internet of Everything. However, with the scarcity of spectrum resources, efficient resource management and sharing is crucial to achieve all these ambitious requirements. One possible technology to enable all of this is blockchain, which has recently gained significance and will be of paramount importance to 6G networks and beyond due to its inherent properties. In particular, the integration of blockchain in 6G will enable the network to monitor and manage resource utilization and sharing efficiently. Hence, in this article, we discuss the potentials of blockchain for resource management and sharing in 6G using multiple application scenarios namely, Internet of things, device-to-device communications, network slicing, and inter-domain blockchain ecosystems.