DeGONet: Decentralized Group-Oriented Interconnection Network for IoT-enabled Metaverse

Abstract

As a transformative technology across various industries, the metaverse has emerged to connect the physical world with the virtual world. During this process, the Internet of Things (IoT) has played a critical role in achieving effective cyber-physical interaction. However, its prevalent centralized interconnection architectures encounter challenges related to interoperability and data privacy, consequently limiting their full potential in human-to-human interactions. To address these challenges, this paper introduces a novel decentralized group-oriented data interconnection network for IoT systems, abbreviated as DeGONet. We propose a group-based trust management model to facilitate user adaptability in data-sharing practices. Additionally, we present a new interaction paradigm based on smart contracts and oracles. Recognizing the potential latency and scalability limitations of existing blockchain structures in large-scale data integration, we devise a novel blockchain structure called Direct Acyclic Graph Tree (DAG-Tree) and a novel consensus mechanism, Proof-of-Verification. These contributions enhance data security while mitigating the hardware and development costs associated with decentralized systems. Through rigorous performance analysis and comparative experiments, we validate the effectiveness and efficiency of our proposed framework in large-scale data interconnection scenarios.