2026
FORGE: An LLM-driven Framework for Large-Scale Smart Contract Vulnerability Dataset Construction
Jiachi Chen, Yiming Shen, Jiashuo Zhang, Zihao Li, John Grundy, Zhenzhe Shao, Yanlin Wang, Jiashui Wang, Ting Chen, Zibin Zheng
IEEE/ACM International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE) 2026
A LLM-driven automated approach for constructing smart contract vulnerability datasets.
FORGE: An LLM-driven Framework for Large-Scale Smart Contract Vulnerability Dataset Construction
Jiachi Chen, Yiming Shen, Jiashuo Zhang, Zihao Li, John Grundy, Zhenzhe Shao, Yanlin Wang, Jiashui Wang, Ting Chen, Zibin Zheng
IEEE/ACM International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE) 2026
A LLM-driven automated approach for constructing smart contract vulnerability datasets.
2025
Maat: Analyzing and Optimizing Overcharge on Blockchain Storage
Zheyuan He, Zihao Li#, Qiao Ao, Jingwei Li#, Feng Luo, Sen Yang, Gelei Deng, Shuwei Song, XiaoSong Zhang, Ting Chen, Xiapu Luo (# corresponding author)
USENIX Conference on File and Storage Technologies (FAST) 2025
A tool designed to address overcharging issues on blockchain storage.
Maat: Analyzing and Optimizing Overcharge on Blockchain Storage
Zheyuan He, Zihao Li#, Qiao Ao, Jingwei Li#, Feng Luo, Sen Yang, Gelei Deng, Shuwei Song, XiaoSong Zhang, Ting Chen, Xiapu Luo (# corresponding author)
USENIX Conference on File and Storage Technologies (FAST) 2025
A tool designed to address overcharging issues on blockchain storage.
Auspex: Unveiling Inconsistency Bugs of Transaction Fee Mechanism in Blockchain
Zheyuan He, Zihao Li#, Jiahao Luo, Feng Luo, Junhan Duan, Jingwei Li#, Shuwei Song, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen, Xiaosong Zhang# (# corresponding author)
USENIX Security 2025
A tool that automatically detects inconsistency bugs within Ethereum's transaction fee mechanism by leveraging fuzzing technology.
Auspex: Unveiling Inconsistency Bugs of Transaction Fee Mechanism in Blockchain
Zheyuan He, Zihao Li#, Jiahao Luo, Feng Luo, Junhan Duan, Jingwei Li#, Shuwei Song, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen, Xiaosong Zhang# (# corresponding author)
USENIX Security 2025
A tool that automatically detects inconsistency bugs within Ethereum's transaction fee mechanism by leveraging fuzzing technology.
Automated Soundness and Completeness Vetting of Polygon zkEVM
Xinghao Peng, Zhiyuan Sun, Kunsong Zhao, Zuchao Ma, Zihao Li, Jinan Jiang, Xiapu Luo, Yinqian Zhang
USENIX Security 2025
A formal verification tool that verifies the soundness and completeness of free inputs with formal semantics for Polygon zkEVM.
Automated Soundness and Completeness Vetting of Polygon zkEVM
Xinghao Peng, Zhiyuan Sun, Kunsong Zhao, Zuchao Ma, Zihao Li, Jinan Jiang, Xiapu Luo, Yinqian Zhang
USENIX Security 2025
A formal verification tool that verifies the soundness and completeness of free inputs with formal semantics for Polygon zkEVM.
Recasting Type Hints from WebAssembly Contracts
Kunsong Zhao, Zihao Li, Weimin Chen, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen, Guozhu Meng, Yajin Zhou
ACM International Conference on the Foundations of Software Engineering (FSE) 2025
A novel solution that leverages deep learning inference to automatically recover high-level parameter and return types from WebAssembly contracts.
Recasting Type Hints from WebAssembly Contracts
Kunsong Zhao, Zihao Li, Weimin Chen, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen, Guozhu Meng, Yajin Zhou
ACM International Conference on the Foundations of Software Engineering (FSE) 2025
A novel solution that leverages deep learning inference to automatically recover high-level parameter and return types from WebAssembly contracts.
2024
fAmulet: Finding Finalization Failure Bugs in Polygon zkRollup
Zihao Li, Xinghao Peng, Zheyuan He, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2024
A tool for identifying finalization failure bugs in Polygon zkRollup by leveraging behavior model guided fuzz testing.
fAmulet: Finding Finalization Failure Bugs in Polygon zkRollup
Zihao Li, Xinghao Peng, Zheyuan He, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2024
A tool for identifying finalization failure bugs in Polygon zkRollup by leveraging behavior model guided fuzz testing.
NURGLE: Exacerbating Resource Consumption in Blockchain State Storage via MPT Manipulation
Zheyuan He*, Zihao Li*, Ao Qiao, Xiapu Luo, Xiaosong Zhang, Ting Chen, Shuwei Song, Dijun Liu, Weina Niu (* equal contribution)
IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (S&P) 2024
We unveil a novel attack surface, i.e., the state storage, in blockchains, and design the first Denial-of-Service attack targeting the state storage by strategically proliferating intermediate nodes within the state storage of Merkle Patricia Trie structure.
NURGLE: Exacerbating Resource Consumption in Blockchain State Storage via MPT Manipulation
Zheyuan He*, Zihao Li*, Ao Qiao, Xiapu Luo, Xiaosong Zhang, Ting Chen, Shuwei Song, Dijun Liu, Weina Niu (* equal contribution)
IEEE Symposium on Security and Privacy (S&P) 2024
We unveil a novel attack surface, i.e., the state storage, in blockchains, and design the first Denial-of-Service attack targeting the state storage by strategically proliferating intermediate nodes within the state storage of Merkle Patricia Trie structure.
DoubleUp Roll: Double-spending in Arbitrum by Rolling It Back
Zhiyuan Sun, Zihao Li, Xinghao Peng, Xiapu Luo, Muhui Jiang, Hao Zhou, Yinqian Zhang
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2024
We unveil novel double spending attacks on Arbitrum and Optimism by strategically triggering state rollback.
DoubleUp Roll: Double-spending in Arbitrum by Rolling It Back
Zhiyuan Sun, Zihao Li, Xinghao Peng, Xiapu Luo, Muhui Jiang, Hao Zhou, Yinqian Zhang
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2024
We unveil novel double spending attacks on Arbitrum and Optimism by strategically triggering state rollback.
Towards Automatic Discovery of Denial of Service Weaknesses in Blockchain Resource Models
Feng Luo, Huangkun Lin, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Ruijie Luo, Zheyuan He, Shuwei Song, Ting Chen, Wenxuan Luo
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2024
An apporach for automatically uncovering DoS weaknesses on diverse blockchains by formal reasoning and attack synthesis.
Towards Automatic Discovery of Denial of Service Weaknesses in Blockchain Resource Models
Feng Luo, Huangkun Lin, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Ruijie Luo, Zheyuan He, Shuwei Song, Ting Chen, Wenxuan Luo
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2024
An apporach for automatically uncovering DoS weaknesses on diverse blockchains by formal reasoning and attack synthesis.
Following the “Thread”: Toward Finding Manipulatable Bottlenecks in Blockchain Clients
Shuohan Wu, Zihao Li, Hao Zhou, Xiapu Luo, Jianfeng Li, Haoyu Wang
ACM SIGSOFT International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis (ISSTA) 2024
A tool for accurately characterizing blockchain client’s execution to facilitate the identification of manipulatable bottlenecks.
Following the “Thread”: Toward Finding Manipulatable Bottlenecks in Blockchain Clients
Shuohan Wu, Zihao Li, Hao Zhou, Xiapu Luo, Jianfeng Li, Haoyu Wang
ACM SIGSOFT International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis (ISSTA) 2024
A tool for accurately characterizing blockchain client’s execution to facilitate the identification of manipulatable bottlenecks.
Are We There Yet? Unraveling the State-of-the-Art Smart Contract Fuzzers
Shuohan Wu, Zihao Li, Luyi Yan, Weimin Chen, Muhui Jiang, Chenxu Wang, Xiapu Luo, Hao Zhou
IEEE/ACM International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE) 2024
We provide a comprehensive review of current research in contract fuzzing, and conduct an in-depth empirical study to evaluate state-of-the-art contract fuzzers’ usability.
Are We There Yet? Unraveling the State-of-the-Art Smart Contract Fuzzers
Shuohan Wu, Zihao Li, Luyi Yan, Weimin Chen, Muhui Jiang, Chenxu Wang, Xiapu Luo, Hao Zhou
IEEE/ACM International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE) 2024
We provide a comprehensive review of current research in contract fuzzing, and conduct an in-depth empirical study to evaluate state-of-the-art contract fuzzers’ usability.
Unearthing Gas-Wasting Code Smells in Smart Contracts with Large Language Models
Jinan Jiang, Zihao Li, Haoran Qin, Muhui Jiang, Xiapu Luo, Xiaoming Wu, Haoyu Wang, Yutian Tang, Chenxiong Qian, Ting Chen
IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering (TSE) 2024
A LLM-based approach for identifying gas-wasting code smells of smart contracts at the source code level.
Unearthing Gas-Wasting Code Smells in Smart Contracts with Large Language Models
Jinan Jiang, Zihao Li, Haoran Qin, Muhui Jiang, Xiapu Luo, Xiaoming Wu, Haoyu Wang, Yutian Tang, Chenxiong Qian, Ting Chen
IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering (TSE) 2024
A LLM-based approach for identifying gas-wasting code smells of smart contracts at the source code level.
Large Language Models for Blockchain Security: A Systematic Literature Review
Zheyuan He, Zihao Li, Sen Yang, He Ye, Ao Qiao, Xiaosong Zhang, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen
arXiv 2024
A systematic literature review for comprehensively analyzing and elucidating how LLMs contribute to enhancing the security of blockchain systems.
Large Language Models for Blockchain Security: A Systematic Literature Review
Zheyuan He, Zihao Li, Sen Yang, He Ye, Ao Qiao, Xiaosong Zhang, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen
arXiv 2024
A systematic literature review for comprehensively analyzing and elucidating how LLMs contribute to enhancing the security of blockchain systems.
2023
Demystifying DeFi MEV Activities in Flashbots Bundle
Zihao Li, Jianfeng Li, Zheyuan He, Xiapu Luo, Ting Wang, Xiaoze Ni, Wenwu Yang, Xi Chen, Ting Chen
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2023
We conduct the first systematic study on DeFi MEV activities in Flashbots bundles by proposing approaches for accurately identifying DeFi actions in transactions of each bundle, and leveraging iterative clustering to facilitate in discovering unknown DeFi MEV activities.
Demystifying DeFi MEV Activities in Flashbots Bundle
Zihao Li, Jianfeng Li, Zheyuan He, Xiapu Luo, Ting Wang, Xiaoze Ni, Wenwu Yang, Xi Chen, Ting Chen
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2023
We conduct the first systematic study on DeFi MEV activities in Flashbots bundles by proposing approaches for accurately identifying DeFi actions in transactions of each bundle, and leveraging iterative clustering to facilitate in discovering unknown DeFi MEV activities.
DeepInfer: Deep Type Inference from Smart Contract Bytecode
Kunsong Zhao, Zihao Li, Jianfeng Li, Ye He, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen
ACM Joint European Software Engineering Conference and Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering (ESEC/FSE) 2023
A novel framework that first leverages deep learning techniques to automatically infer function signatures and returns of smart contract bytecode.
DeepInfer: Deep Type Inference from Smart Contract Bytecode
Kunsong Zhao, Zihao Li, Jianfeng Li, Ye He, Xiapu Luo, Ting Chen
ACM Joint European Software Engineering Conference and Symposium on the Foundations of Software Engineering (ESEC/FSE) 2023
A novel framework that first leverages deep learning techniques to automatically infer function signatures and returns of smart contract bytecode.
BlockExplorer: Exploring Blockchain Big Data via Parallel Processing
Shipeng Li, Jingwei Li, Yuxing Tang, Xiapu Luo, Zheyuan He, Zihao Li, Xi Chen, Yang Bai, Ting Chen, Yuzhe Tang, Zhe Liu, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Transactions on Computers (TC) 2023
An efficient and flexible blockchain exploration system for Ethereum builds on a master-slave architecture, where the master partitions all blocks into multiple nonoverlapped sets and each slave simultaneously processes Ethereum Big Data based on a set of blocks.
BlockExplorer: Exploring Blockchain Big Data via Parallel Processing
Shipeng Li, Jingwei Li, Yuxing Tang, Xiapu Luo, Zheyuan He, Zihao Li, Xi Chen, Yang Bai, Ting Chen, Yuzhe Tang, Zhe Liu, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Transactions on Computers (TC) 2023
An efficient and flexible blockchain exploration system for Ethereum builds on a master-slave architecture, where the master partitions all blocks into multiple nonoverlapped sets and each slave simultaneously processes Ethereum Big Data based on a set of blocks.
2022
TokenCat: Detect Flaw of Authentication on ERC20 Tokens
Zheyuan He, Zhou Liao, Feng Luo, Dijun Liu, Ting Chen, Zihao Li
IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC) 2022
A tool for detecting authentication defects in ERC20 tokens by utilizing symbolic execution on token bytecode to identify authentication-related data structures and infer the corresponding authentication behaviors.
TokenCat: Detect Flaw of Authentication on ERC20 Tokens
Zheyuan He, Zhou Liao, Feng Luo, Dijun Liu, Ting Chen, Zihao Li
IEEE International Conference on Communications (ICC) 2022
A tool for detecting authentication defects in ERC20 tokens by utilizing symbolic execution on token bytecode to identify authentication-related data structures and infer the corresponding authentication behaviors.
2021
SigRec: Automatic Recovery of Function Signatures in Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Xiaofeng Wang, Ting Wang, Zheyuan He, Kezhao Fang, Yufei Zhang, Hang Zhu, Hongwei Li, Yan Cheng, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering (TSE) 2021
A novel framework that leverages how functions are handled by Ethereum virtual machine to automatically recover function signatures from contract bytecode.
SigRec: Automatic Recovery of Function Signatures in Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Xiaofeng Wang, Ting Wang, Zheyuan He, Kezhao Fang, Yufei Zhang, Hang Zhu, Hongwei Li, Yan Cheng, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering (TSE) 2021
A novel framework that leverages how functions are handled by Ethereum virtual machine to automatically recover function signatures from contract bytecode.
2020
Understanding Ethereum via Graph Analysis
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Yuxiao Zhu, Jiachi Chen, Xiapu Luo, John Chi-Shing Lui, Xiaodong Lin, Xiaosong Zhang
ACM Transactions on Internet Technology (TOIT) 2020
We leverage graph analysis to systematically characterize three major activities on Ethereum, namely money transfer, smart contract creation, and smart contract invocation, and tackle three security issues based on graphs.
Understanding Ethereum via Graph Analysis
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Yuxiao Zhu, Jiachi Chen, Xiapu Luo, John Chi-Shing Lui, Xiaodong Lin, Xiaosong Zhang
ACM Transactions on Internet Technology (TOIT) 2020
We leverage graph analysis to systematically characterize three major activities on Ethereum, namely money transfer, smart contract creation, and smart contract invocation, and tackle three security issues based on graphs.
GasChecker: Scalable Analysis for Discovering Gas-Inefficient Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Youzheng Feng, Zihao Li, Hao Zhou, Xiapu Luo, Xiaoqi Li, Xiuzhuo Xiao, Jiachi Chen, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Transactions on Emerging Topics in Computing (TETC) 2020
We develop a tool for automatically identifying gas-inefficient code in smart contracts, and conduct an empirical study on the prevalence of gas-inefficient code in smart contracts.
GasChecker: Scalable Analysis for Discovering Gas-Inefficient Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Youzheng Feng, Zihao Li, Hao Zhou, Xiapu Luo, Xiaoqi Li, Xiuzhuo Xiao, Jiachi Chen, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Transactions on Emerging Topics in Computing (TETC) 2020
We develop a tool for automatically identifying gas-inefficient code in smart contracts, and conduct an empirical study on the prevalence of gas-inefficient code in smart contracts.
2019
TokenScope: Automatically Detecting Inconsistent Behaviors of Cryptocurrency Tokens in Ethereum
Ting Chen, Yufei Zhang, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Ting Wang, Rong Cao, Xiuzhuo Xiao, Xiaosong Zhang
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2019
A novel approach for automatically detecting inconsistent behaviors in token contracts that can confuse token holders by contrasting the behaviors derived from three different sources.
TokenScope: Automatically Detecting Inconsistent Behaviors of Cryptocurrency Tokens in Ethereum
Ting Chen, Yufei Zhang, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Ting Wang, Rong Cao, Xiuzhuo Xiao, Xiaosong Zhang
ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) 2019
A novel approach for automatically detecting inconsistent behaviors in token contracts that can confuse token holders by contrasting the behaviors derived from three different sources.
A Large-Scale Empirical Study on Control Flow Identification of Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Yufei Zhang, Xiapu Luo, Ting Wang, Teng Hu, Xiuzhuo Xiao, Dong Wang, Jin Huang, Xiaosong Zhang
International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM) 2019
A comprehensive empirical study on six widely-used tools for smart contract analysis by using all deployed smart contracts to understand their capabilities to recognize control flow transfers.
A Large-Scale Empirical Study on Control Flow Identification of Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Yufei Zhang, Xiapu Luo, Ting Wang, Teng Hu, Xiuzhuo Xiao, Dong Wang, Jin Huang, Xiaosong Zhang
International Symposium on Empirical Software Engineering and Measurement (ESEM) 2019
A comprehensive empirical study on six widely-used tools for smart contract analysis by using all deployed smart contracts to understand their capabilities to recognize control flow transfers.
DataEther: Data Exploration Framework For Ethereum
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Yufei Zhang, Xiapu Luo, Ang Chen, Kun Yang, Bin Hu, Tong Zhu, Shifang Deng, Teng Hu, Jiachi Chen, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS) 2019
A systematic and high-fidelity data exploration framework for Ethereum by exploiting its internal mechanisms.
DataEther: Data Exploration Framework For Ethereum
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Yufei Zhang, Xiapu Luo, Ang Chen, Kun Yang, Bin Hu, Tong Zhu, Shifang Deng, Teng Hu, Jiachi Chen, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS) 2019
A systematic and high-fidelity data exploration framework for Ethereum by exploiting its internal mechanisms.
2018
Towards Saving Money in Using Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Hao Zhou, Jiachi Chen, Xiapu Luo, Xiaoqi Li, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE International Conference on Software Engineering - New Ideas and Emerging Results (ICSE NIER) 2018
We first identify 24 anti-patterns from the execution traces of real smart contracts. Then, we design a novel tool to automatically detect all these anti-patterns from the bytecode of smart contracts and replace them with efficient code through bytecode-to-bytecode optimization.
Towards Saving Money in Using Smart Contracts
Ting Chen, Zihao Li, Hao Zhou, Jiachi Chen, Xiapu Luo, Xiaoqi Li, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE International Conference on Software Engineering - New Ideas and Emerging Results (ICSE NIER) 2018
We first identify 24 anti-patterns from the execution traces of real smart contracts. Then, we design a novel tool to automatically detect all these anti-patterns from the bytecode of smart contracts and replace them with efficient code through bytecode-to-bytecode optimization.
Understanding Ethereum via Graph Analysis
Ting Chen, Yuxiao Zhu, Zihao Li, Jiachi Chen, Xiaoqi Li, Xiapu Luo, Xiaodong Lin, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Conference on Computer Communications (Infocom) 2018
We conduct a systematic study on Ethereum by leveraging graph analysis to characterize three major activities on Ethereum, and propose new approaches based on cross-graph analysis to address two security issues in Ethereum.
Understanding Ethereum via Graph Analysis
Ting Chen, Yuxiao Zhu, Zihao Li, Jiachi Chen, Xiaoqi Li, Xiapu Luo, Xiaodong Lin, Xiaosong Zhang
IEEE Conference on Computer Communications (Infocom) 2018
We conduct a systematic study on Ethereum by leveraging graph analysis to characterize three major activities on Ethereum, and propose new approaches based on cross-graph analysis to address two security issues in Ethereum.
2017
An Adaptive Gas Cost Mechanism for Ethereum to Defend Against Under-Priced DoS Attacks
Ting Chen, Xiaoqi Li, Ying Wang, Jiachi Chen, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Man Ho Au, Xiaosong Zhang
International Conference on Information Security Practice and Experience (ISPEC) 2017
We propose an emulationbased framework to automatically measure the resource consumptions of EVM operations for mitigating the under-priced DoS attacks in Ethereum.
An Adaptive Gas Cost Mechanism for Ethereum to Defend Against Under-Priced DoS Attacks
Ting Chen, Xiaoqi Li, Ying Wang, Jiachi Chen, Zihao Li, Xiapu Luo, Man Ho Au, Xiaosong Zhang
International Conference on Information Security Practice and Experience (ISPEC) 2017
We propose an emulationbased framework to automatically measure the resource consumptions of EVM operations for mitigating the under-priced DoS attacks in Ethereum.