Blockchain-Assisted QoS-Aware Routing for Software-Defined Wide Area Network

Cloud computing revolutionizes the way computing resources are managed, delivered, and accessed as it aims to provide the notion of unlimited resources (e.g., computing services, storage, applications, etc.) over the internet with a flexible model for accessing them. Cloud computing performs the required computations at its data centers, and the remote end-users are highly dependent on the provided internet facilities by the network providers like Internet Service Providers (ISPs) to avail the services provided by the cloud. In most cases, cloud-based architecture cannot ensure the Quality of Service (QoS) aspects of the provided remotely located services due to the high dependencies on the internet. Such limitations of traditional cloud computing models can be addressed with the advent of edge computing by bringing computation closer to the consumer or by considering data storage closer to the source of data generation. While edge computing effectively addresses latency issues inherent in cloud computing, it does not entirely overcome the requirement for high computational resources and related network dependency associated with accessing cloud services. On the traditional internet, it is a challenge for the intermediary ISPs to ensure the QoS required by their direct and indirect end-users to avail cloud services. The software-defined wide area network (SD-WAN) has emerged as a promising architecture for the next generation of wide area networks (WANs) where providers can enhance their cooperation, specifically in ensuring QoS aspects. In this article, a QoS-aware routing protocol using SD-WAN is proposed to fulfill the stringent QoS requirements for cloud services. Additionally, a blockchain-based trading model is proposed to address the challenge of providing financial benefits to the ISPs in an automated and trustworthy manner for their provided support in satisfying the required QoS with additional or special workload of routing state management. Finally, this research leverages the dynamic network management capability to address the challenges of accessing cloud services with any QoS requirement.