PYRAMID: A Protocol for Private and Trustless Multi-level Marketing on the Blockchain (Long Version)
Giovanna Kobus Conrado, Amir Kafshdar Goharshady, Kha Nhat Long Nguyen · HAL (Le Centre pour la Communication Scientifique Directe) · 2024
The inherent traceability of blockchain transactions and smart contracts raises serious privacy concerns, especially in contexts such as private multi-level marketing in which maintaining the anonymity of relationships is paramount. In this work, we present PYRAMID, a protocol leveraging blind signature techniques that provides a smart-contract-based multilevel marketing implementation which is both private, i.e. no one can find out the relationships between people, and trustless. We specifically focus on the unique challenges posed by pyramidlike schemes, where funds must flow between members and their referrers without revealing their relationship. Our protocol achieves this by anonymizing the referral process, allowing for secure transactions without compromising privacy. We also provide a detailed security analysis showing that our approach attains the desired operational and privacy requirements.