#A Faster Bitcoin Network A modified version of the bitcoin protocol that reduces the delay of information dissemination in the Bitcoin network.
Semester Thesis for the: Information Technology and Electrical Engineering MSc
Distributed Computing Group, Computer Engineering and Networks Laboratory, ETH Zurich
Supervisors: Christian Decker, Prof. Dr. Roger Wattenhofer
January 21, 2015
http://pub.tik.ee.ethz.ch/students/2014-HS/SA-2014-42.pdf
##Abstract
Bitcoin is an electronic currency based on a peer-to-peer network for the propagation and verification of the transactions.
Nowadays, cashless transactions are becoming increasingly popular and bitcoin could be an established currency for such
transactions. Its distributed nature, though, and more specifically the delay overhead in transaction verification, not
only makes the use of bitcoin ineficient for instant transactions, but also makes it vulnerable to double spend attacks.
In this work we introduce a modified version of the bitcoin protocol and argue its impact on the delay of information
dissemination in the bitcoin network. More specifcally we examine how pipelining the message exchange between nodes in the
bitcoin network as well as encouraging the connection of the geographically closest nodes afect the delay in propagation.