A Game Theoretical View of Byzantine Fault Tolerance Design

This paper investigates the optimal Byzantine Fault Tolerance (BFT) design strategies from a game theoretical point of view. The problem of BFT is formulated as a constant-sum game played by the BFT system (Defender) and its adversary (Attacker). The defender resorts to replication to ensure high reliability and availability, while the attacker injects faults to the defender with the purpose of reducing the system's reliability and/or availability. This paper examines current BFT solutions and proposes a number of improvements based on the game theoretical study.