Transparent Transaction Ordering in Blockchain-Based Collaborative Processes

Blockchain technology offers a promising solution for overcoming trust-related challenges, such as transparency in interorganizational collaborative processes. However, since the ordering of transactions in a block can affect the outcome of a process instance, fairness and transparency concerns regarding block selection may arise. This paper presents a consensus-agnostic approach to promote transparency in transaction ordering in blockchain-based business processes. The approach allows participants to align the execution order of their transactions with their business objectives, effectively mitigating the lack of transparency associated with the arbitrary selection and ordering of transactions during block selection. Our experiments reveal that the increased transparency mitigates the risks of suppression and displacement attacks at the cost of introducing additional latency and cost.