Network

Permissionless Network

A public blockchain network is completely open and anyone is free to join and participate in the core activities of the blockchain network.

Anyone can join or leave, read, write and audit the ongoing activities on the public blockchain network, which helps a public blockchain maintain its self-governed nature. As anyone can join a permissionless blockchain, they tend to be far more decentralized than a permissioned system.

All members have the right to perform all the actions including adding & validating transactions, smart contracts, and much more. With a permissionless blockchain, there is no barrier to entry to use it. It is equivalent to a decentralized system. Anyone can run a node. Permissionless blockchains enable anyone to interact with it. The transactions on it are approved and handled by votes/agreement and consensus mechanisms.

• They are decentralized – no centralized entity is needed to approve or change the protocols in the system. Permissionless (public) blockchains are usually based on consensus protocols dictated by the users. This means that as long as at least 50% +1 users agree to a network change, it can go ahead.

• They offer anonymity – in order to access and transact with a public network, users usually don’t have to enter their personal information. However, there are some cases where some information is legally required, such as when trading crypto.

• They are transparent – one major attraction of blockchain networks is their transparency. Users know they can trust the network because they’re given access to all information related to a process or transaction.

• Immutable and Secure - To validate a transaction on a blockchain, more than 51% of the nodes must agree and validate the transaction. These nodes are random individuals and entities spread across the globe. So, once a transaction is recorded, it becomes impossible for another 51% or more nodes to agree to alter the data of a particular block at the same time.

Open Network

The public network operates on an incentivizing scheme that encourages new participants to join and keep the network agile. Public blockchains offer particularly valuable solutions from the point of view of a truly decentralized, democratized and authority-free operation.

The data on these blockchains is publicly available, and complete copies of the ledgers are stored across the globe. This is what makes it hard to censor or hack these systems. No one has control over the network. Transaction information stored on blockchains is usually validated by the public. With no third-parties to regulate what goes on, the system relies on this to reach a public consensus on what transactions are considered true.

These blockchains are considered fully decentralized and secured using advanced cryptography, whereas economic incentives are provided for users who work to keep the integrity of the network. The transactions are completely irreversible on a blockchain by its design, meaning once confirmed by its nodes the blockchain transactions cannot be reversed.

• Availability: Being a distributed system, the record of a transaction is maintained by the whole network resulting in no single point of failure. A prevalent critique of blockchain is that it does not guarantee confidentiality—the first part of the CIA triumvirate.

• Fault tolerance: The goal of Byzantine fault tolerance is to be able to defend against failures, in which components of a system fail in arbitrary ways, and there is imperfect information about the state of the failure.

• Integrity: The benefits of DLT, in security terms, are primarily around integrity. Since each transaction in a block has to be recorded by the whole network, it is complicated to tamper.