BLOCK 1

Visualization of Blockchain Data: A Systematic Review
Natkamon Tovanich, Nicolas Heulot, Jean-Daniel Fekete, Petra Isenberg
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Natkamon Tovanich, Nicolas Heulot, Jean-Daniel Fekete, Petra Isenberg. Visualization of Blockchain
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IEEE TVCG SURVEY PAPER - REVISED VERSION 1
Visualization of Blockchain Data:

A Systematic Review
Natkamon Tovanich, Nicolas Heulot, Jean-Daniel Fekete, and Petra Isenberg
Abstract—We present a systematic review of visual analytics tools used for the analysis of blockchains-related data. The blockchain
concept has recently received considerable attention and spurred applications in a variety of domains. We systematically and
quantitatively assessed 76 analytics tools that have been proposed in research as well as online by professionals and blockchain
enthusiasts. Our classification of these tools distinguishes (1) target blockchains, (2) blockchain data, (3) target audiences, (4) task
domains, and (5) visualization types. Furthermore, we look at which aspects of blockchain data have already been explored and point out
areas that deserve more investigation in the future.
Index Terms—Blockchain, Bitcoin, Ethereum, Information Visualization, Visual Analytics, State-of-the-Art Survey.
1 I NTRODUCTION
B LOCKCHAIN technology has become popular in the last from both online websites and academic articles and refer
10 years after the Bitcoin cryptocurrency was introduced to those articles and websites as “sources” throughout the
by Satoshi Nakamoto [33]. Since then, the blockchain concept article. We systematically assessed the motivations and
has been used to develop decentralized systems to store characteristics of each source and defined a classification
and maintain the integrity of time-stamped transaction data scheme to group visualizations based on five aspects: target
across peer-to-peer networks. Bitcoin [33] and Ethereum [48] blockchains, blockchain data, task domains, target users,
are popular examples of blockchain use for digital currencies, and visualization types. Finally, we provide a summary of
smart contracts, and decentralized applications. As the blockchain visualizations that have been proposed as well as
technology has revolutionized transactions and exchanges, it perspectives on aspects that are rarely explored and would
found applications in various industries, including energy benefit from further exploration.
production, mobility, and logistics [13].
Despite its active use, blockchain is a new technology and
its use in practice is still evolving and poorly understood.
2 BACKGROUND ON B LOCKCHAIN T ECHNOLOGY
Broadly, a blockchain is a decentralized system governed The blockchain concept was introduced in the early 1990s as
by autonomous mechanisms that ensures the data stored a theoretical system to store a time-stamped digital document
among peers is correct and that prevents possible fraudulent that cannot be modified [5] [19]. The articles proposed data
activities. Blockchain data is stored and maintained among structures and algorithms to store non-modifiable data and
peers in the network by the consensus of the network maintain trust in decentralized systems without central
majority. As a result, activities on the blockchain are driven control. In 2008, a person or group of people under the
by the interaction of its users, in contrast to centralized pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto published the seminal article:
controlled systems where users are regulated by a central “Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System” [33] that
server. In order to adopt blockchain technology in a wider set proposed a way to prevent double-spending of digital
of domains, we will need to explore and analyze transaction currency transactions without requiring a trusted third-party
data to better understand emergent user behavior and [43]. Since then, the blockchain has been implemented in
mechanisms in blockchain systems. As such, visualization many different domains, including cryptocurrency, smart
and visual analytics (referred to as “VA”) tools can support contracts, and intellectual property management [42].
human analysts in deriving first hypotheses and models of Among the existing blockchains in the public domain, Bit-
blockchain use. coin and Ethereum are the most well-known public blockchain
We contribute a systematic overview of past solutions platforms. Both of them use different instantiations of the
proposed in the VA community, but also take a close look blockchain concept. Bitcoin has currently the most widely
at how blockchain visualizations are used by practitioners used cryptocurrency blockchain with the highest total market
and researchers in economics, computer science, and even capitalization (∼$140 billion), as of November, 2019 [11].
public audiences. For our survey, we collected visualizations Bitcoin blockchain data alone contains over 470 million
transactions (over 250 GB of raw data) and is constantly
growing [O10]. Its currency is the Bitcoin (BTC), valued
• N. Tovanich and N. Heulot are with IRT SystemX, Paris-Saclay, France. ∼$7.66k with important fluctuations.
E-mail: {natkamon.tovanich, nicolas.heulot}@irt-systemx.fr
• N. Tovanich, J.-D. Fekete, and P. Isenberg are with Inria, France. On the other hand, Ethereum focuses on the implemen-
E-mail: {natkamon.tovanich, jean-daniel.fekete, petra.isenberg}@inria.fr tation of smart contracts [48]. A smart contract is a piece
• N. Tovanich is also with Université Paris-Saclay, France. of computer code that is guaranteed to run in the same
Manuscript received September 24, 2019; revised December 20, 2019. way on all peers. Ethereum has a currency unit called Ether
which is used to pay for machines executing the code. addresses. All the value of input addresses is sent to the
As of November, 2019, there are more than 590 million output addresses, so the input addresses end-up empty at
transactions amounted to over 200 GB data size in the the end of the transaction, except that the transaction can
Ethereum ledger [O21]. It has been increasingly adopted send change back to the owner, on any of his or her addresses.
by companies that formed the Ethereum Enterprise Alliance If the amount transferred is less than the total amount held
(EEA) in February 2017. Among the founding members were by the input addresses, the change is left as a transaction fee
big companies such as, Microsoft, JP Morgan, Accenture, and for the miner who will validate the block.
Intel [15]. Because the blockchain is a decentralized system, a
concensus protocol is needed to decide which transaction is
valid and should be added to the ledger. Many blockchain-
2.1 How does the Bitcoin blockchain work? based systems, including Bitcoin and Ethereum, adopt Proof-of-
Since the Bitcoin blockchain is currently the most well-known Work (PoW) protocols. Miners are in charge of maintaining the
(popular) and widely-used (active) blockchain in the public blockchain ledger and propose a new block to the network.
domain, we will start by explaining the mechanism behind Since this operation is expensive, they need a reward. The
the Bitcoin system as many of its concepts also similarly miner who successfully proposed a new block can reclaim
apply to other types of blockchains. In this section, we a coinbase transaction: it includes newly generated value and
provide a simplified description for general audiences and transaction fees from every transaction in a block. Yet, the
refer to the book “Mastering Bitcoin: Programming the Open validation is performed as a competition: multiple miners
Blockchain” [2] for more technical detail about the Bitcoin perform the computations to validate the block which is, in
blockchain. short, trying to find a number that gives a hash with a specific
The blockchain is a public ledger that records a list of form. The first miner who solves the puzzle can propose a
transactions in the distributed network. For Bitcoin, most new block to the network and claim the reward if the majority
of these transactions are of cryptocurrency value transfers, of miners agree to include it in their ledgers. Therefore,
but more complex transactions are possible (e.g., simple miners get their reward but not regularly in proportion
smart contracts, multi-signatures, etc.). Just like regular to their computational power. The difficulty of mining is
transactions, blockchain transactions need to be validated: decided by the total computation power in the blockchain
the sending and receiving addresses need to be valid, network (so-called hash rate) which often adapts to reach the
the sending account needs to contain enough value to be desired rate of adding a new block every 10 minutes. The
transferred (technically called, unspent transaction outputs mining process ensures that the data in the Bitcoin blockchain
(UTXOs)) and senders need to have the right to spend the is consistent and prevents attacks from malicious users.
value. In traditional banks, these validations are performed Like in Bitcoin, other blockchains share the general idea
by the bank itself which has to be trusted to avoid double of a growing, verifiable but immutable list of records stored
spending or stealing. in blocks that are linked to one another. Cryptographic
With blockchain technology, the ledger is public and measures are used to encode links between blocks. In contrast
distributed. The validation is performed through a consensus to the bitcoin blockchain, however, other blockchains may
reached by a pool of people called miners. Anyone can decide implement a different protocol to store transactions and
to become a miner; it only requires very powerful machines regulate the consensus in their decentralized networks.
and a good network connection. The validation is done by Examples of alternative consensus protocols are Proof-of-stake
block, so when transactions are issued, they are buffered (PoS), Practical Byzantine Fault Tolerance (PBFT), Ripple and
and pending in the mempool (i.e. transactions waiting to be Tendermint. We refer readers to Zheng et al.’s survey [50] that
confirmed/included in a new block). Those transactions are describes different blockchain protocols in greater detail.
collected and verified by the miners. Some transactions can
be rejected, and for the valid ones, they are included in 2.2 Elements of blockchain data
a new block. Then, the new block is added to a chain of Here, we generalize blockchain data elements and illustrate
blocks (the updated ledger) that cannot be changed, hence those data elements by giving concrete examples in Bitcoin.
the term blockchain. The blocks are considered valid if they We will refer to these generalized types of blockchain data in
are accepted by the majority of nodes. our classification scheme.
The validation miners perform involves running com- A transaction is the most granular level of blockchain
putationally expensive methods to verify the validity of data. It records a transfer of value between addresses. In
the transaction parties and amounts transferred. These Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies, a transaction record
methods are based on public-key cryptography. There are contains pseudonymous input and output address(es) with
also technical differences between a traditional transaction the value to transfer or received associated with each address.
and blockchain transactions. In the Bitcoin blockchain, the Transaction records are stored in a data structure called
transactions are done from addresses and not from accounts. a block. Blocks hold and group a certain number of trans-
An address can be created at any time for free, and is actions. Multiple blocks are connected in a linked list called
represented as a long string with cryptographic properties a ledger. Nodes are electronic devices that maintain and
to be able to validate its owner. The owner of the address distribute a copy of the ledger in the blockchain network so
cannot be inferred from the address itself so transactions are that the data remains synchronized. Miners are special nodes
almost anonymous, though they can be tracked, hence they in the peer-to-peer network that participate in verifying
are referred to as pseudonymous. One transaction can involve transactions and adding new blocks to the ledger, with the
several input addresses and send value to multiple output possibility to receive a reward.
An entity represents a real blockchain user or organiza- prior work on the state-of-the-art in blockchain research that
tion behind a transaction. When input and output addresses we reviewed to inform our own classification scheme of
are pseudonymous, entities cannot be directly inferred from blockchain VA tools.
the blockchain. In addition, an address is meant to be used
only once as a conventional practice in the cryptocurrency Reviews on blockchain technology: Most of the existing
blockchain community for privacy and security purposes. literature reviews on blockchain research focus on a technical
Yet, we can trace the activities of addresses on the perspective. For example, Zheng et al. [50] presented a com-
blockchain without knowing the real-world identity of prehensive review of the current advancement of blockchain
entities behind transactions. Research has shown that sim- technology. The authors describe common blockchain charac-
ple heuristics can be used to group pseudonymous input teristics: decentralization, persistency, anonymity, and auditabil-
addresses into entities [1] [A13] [A15] [A16]. By simply group- ity; and then compare the differences among consensus
ing addresses, entities remain pseudonymous. Yet, external algorithms. The article also lists real-world applications
data sources exist that provide a list of addresses that belong that can benefit from blockchain architectures. Bonneau
to well-known entities such as WalletExplorer.com [22], et al. [8] provide an analysis of algorithms and protocols
Bitcoin Forum [32], and Blockchain.info [O10]. used specifically in Bitcoin and cryptocurrencies. The article
highlights stability and security limitations in the current
2.3 Types of blockchain cryptocurrency blockchains and proposes future challenges.
Yli-Huumo et al. [49] collected 48 research articles on
Blockchains can be categorized into three types: pub-
blockchain technology which the authors summarized into
lic blockchains, consortium blockchains, and private
7 categories based on technical challenges and limitations.
blockchains [10] [50].
One of the technical challenges discussed in the article is
• Public blockchains are open blockchains in which any
usability from a user’s perspective. The authors emphasized the
participant can read, write, and submit transactions necessity of analytical tools to improve the ability of users to
to the ledger. Any participant can join the consensus analyze and detect patterns in the blockchain network. None
process to determine whether to add blocks and trans- of these past reviews refer to visualization, which is the focus
actions to the ledger. Public blockchains are suitable for of our review.
applications that are open for everyone and need fully
Reviews on blockchain analytics: Balaskas and Fran-
decentralized systems. Bitcoin is a well-known example
queira [3] examined analytic tools for the Bitcoin blockchain
of a public blockchain.
that are available on the internet and proposed a taxonomy
• Consortium blockchains are semi-private blockchains
based on analysis themes: analysis of entity relationships,
that restrict the consensus process to the selected group
metadata, money flows, user behavior, transaction fee, and market /
of participants that are trusted by the system. This re-
wallets. The found tools are mainly able to track and monitor
duces the time to verify transactions and blocks but also
cryptocurrency values, and therefore are useful for detecting
makes the systems partially centralized to selected nodes.
fraudulent transactions. Another article by Bartoletti et al. [4]
Permission to operate a node on a consortium blockchain
surveyed Bitcoin and cryptocurrency analysis tools found in
is granted by the overseeing group of organizations.
academic articles and websites. The tools in their survey were
• Private blockchains are fully controlled by an organi-
classified based on analysis goals: anonymity, market analytics,
zation that determines the consensus of the blockchain
cyber-crime, metadata and transaction fees. For each analysis
ledger. The private blockchain owner has an authority
goal, the authors further specified the kind of blockchain-
to allow or restrict the read permission to participants.
related data used in the tools, such as transaction graphs,
Private blockchains are centralized systems, similar to
address tags, IP addresses, mining pools, exchange rates, and lists of
database systems, and usually suitable for applications
DDoS attacks; and listed all sources that they retrieved. Based
which require high trust and privacy.
on the survey, the authors developed a general framework
Some of the criteria described at the beginning of Sect. 2 for blockchain analytics and showed use cases of analyzing
differ for consortium and private blockchains, where, for transaction fees and Bitcoin metadata. Both articles collected
example, consensus is determined by selected nodes that can tools dedicated only to the Bitcoin blockchain and classified
be trusted, and therefore past records could theoretically be them based on analytics tasks rather than visualization of
tampered with. In the remainder of the article, we focus blockchain data; which is the goal of our present work.
on public blockchains as our systematic review did not
Reviews on blockchain visualization: We found only
uncover analyses or tools dedicated to private or consor-
one literature review on blockchain visualization. Sundara
tium blockchains. In this article, we also do not consider
et al. [41] reviewed 8 Bitcoin tools available on the internet
solutions like sidechains that allow interoperability between
and provided a short description on visual representations
blockchains or that speed up transaction validation (e.g.,
and implementations. Most tools in their survey performed
Lightning Network) because they introduce specificities that
real-time monitoring for Bitcoin transactions. Nonetheless,
we consider out of the general scope of our survey.
the authors neither performed an exhaustive search nor
proposed a method to classify the tools they found. In our
3 R ELATED W ORK previous work, we collected 46 online Bitcoin visualization
A large number of research disciplines are interested in the tools using a systematic review approach and classified them
blockchain, including algorithms, software formal verifica- based on analysis tasks and visual representations [46]. In this
tion, database systems, computer security, system architec- article, we extend our data collection to include other kinds of
ture, data security, and economics. Here, we summarize blockchains (e.g., Ethereum) from research articles and online
sources, and provide a more complete classification scheme web page had to contain interactive graphics showing raw or
that additionally considers blockchain data visualized, target aggregated data that is stored on a blockchain. We excluded
audiences, and task domains. web pages that showed only market data on cryptocurrency
exchanges (e.g., the current $ value of a Bitcoin).
4 DATA C OLLECTION
4.4 Data collection result
We identified visualization tools for blockchain data from
Using our systematic review approach, we collected the
both academic articles and online sources. In this section, we
following number of sources:
describe the data collection procedure and the criteria we
used to include literature related to blockchain visualization.
Literature Survey Sources
4.1 Identifying search idioms Visualization Articles Analysis Articles Online Total
14 17 45 76
The first step in our analysis was to determine the right search
terms for identifying the most relevant articles. We chose four Most of the tools we found came from online sources
starting search terms: “blockchain”, “bitcoin”, “cryptocurrency”, (59%) while visualization articles represented only 19% of
and “ethereum”; as we expected them to result in good all sources. The remaining 22% of sources are data analysis
coverage of blockchain-related articles. To narrow down articles that provide empirical analyses of the blockchain
the literature to tools related to visualization techniques networks and communicate the findings using static images.
for blockchains, we used the character sequence “visual” to We decided to include data analysis articles to understand
cover keywords such as “visualization”, “visual analytics”, possible questions that researchers are interested in and
“visualizing”, etc. In addition, we used the character sequences common visualization types they used to convey their results.
“data analy” and “graph” to return articles that did not Throughout this article, we include references to our
specifically use any “visual”-related key terms. We decided to sources using the following naming scheme: visualization
be relatively broad in our search terms in order to optimize articles ([V#]), data analysis articles ([A#]), and online sources
for recall rather than precision of the search result. ([O#]). Full references to these sources are available in Table 1.
4.2 Searching academic articles 5 C LASSIFICATION S CHEME AND M ETHODOLOGY

We selected 6 scientific databases to retrieve articles: (1) In defining our classification scheme, we considered many
IEEE Xplore, (2) ACM Digital Library, (3) ScienceDirect, (4) visualization-related categories such as data, task, types of
DBLP, (5) Springer Link, and (6) Google Scholar. We used visualizations, or end-users. After several rounds of open
search engines available in those databases and applied the coding with an evolving code-set, we converged on five main
above search idioms to retrieve relevant articles. The initial aspects for delineating blockchain visualization sources: (1)
search was performed in April 2019, but we included newly target blockchains, (2) blockchain data, (3) target audiences,
published relevant articles that appeared later up to the time (4) task domains, and (5) visualization types. Fig. 1 gives
of submission. an overview of our classification scheme. In this section, we
After these individual searches, we combined resulting present the classification scheme we applied to each source
articles from these six databases and removed duplicates. as well as summary statistics that show how many sources
We next screened the returned results by reading the title included visualizations within the given category. As a result,
of returned articles one by one and selected articles that the total counts and percentages we report do not necessarily
seemed to potentially include blockchain visualizations correspond to 76 / 100%—the number of total sources we
beyond simple charts. If the title did not clearly describe collected—as sources may have included multiple types of
the relevance of an article, we additionally read the abstract visualizations in the classification scheme.
before deciding on inclusion in our survey. Inclusion criteria
were: (a) the article is related to VA on any blockchain, and 5.1 Target Blockchains
(b) the article includes a data analysis on any blockchain Blockchain visualization sources in our survey were targeted
technology and uses visualization to communicate results. at the following blockchains:
Number of sources for different target blockchains
4.3 Searching online web-based visualization
Bitcoin Ethereum Others
To collect blockchain visualization tools that are available 60 19 10
on the internet, we typed every search idioms from the
combination of (“blockchain” OR “bitcoin” OR “cryptocur- With 79%, data from the Bitcoin blockchain was the most
rency” OR “ethereum”) AND (“analysis” OR “analytics” OR common to be visually represented. This is not surprising as
“visualization” OR “visual analytics” OR “graph” OR “chart”) the Bitcoin blockchain is the oldest running cryptocurrency
on Google Search and retrieved the first 100 results. We blockchain and still widely used nowadays. The Ethereum
followed the link to each web page one by one, looked at blockchain was the second-most common visually repre-
it, and checked whether the web page contained blockchain sented blockchain (25%). Only 13% of our sources were
visualizations. In the case of web pages that contained links dedicated to other kinds of blockchains—all cryptocurrency
to other visualization tools, we followed each link in the blockchains—such as those of Namecoin [34], Litecoin [28],
web page and added the link to our list. To be selected, the Dogecoin [44], and Dash [12].
Classiﬁcation Scheme of Visualization on Blockchain Data
Target Blockchains Blockchain Data Target Audiences Task Domains Visualization Types
Bitcoin Blockchain components Novices Transaction detail analysis Charts

Ethereum Entities Intermediates Transaction network analysis Time series
Others Nodes Experts Cybercrime detection Tree and graph visualizations
Mining Cryptocurrency exchange Multi-dimensional
Network activities analysis visualizations
External data Peer-to-peer (P2P) network Map-based visualizations
activity analysis Casual visualizations
Casual/entertaining information
communication
Fig. 1. The diagram shows the classification scheme of visualizations on blockchain data we developed after several rounds of assessing and
characterizing sources we collected.
We did not find visualization tools on consortium and online news, socio-economic data (e.g., percentage of internet
private blockchains, such as Hyperledger [45] and Dragon- users, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita, or the
chain [14], likely because those kinds of blockchains are human development index (HDI)), social media information,
developed inside private organizations and data is not or Google Trends data. The most common external data
publicly available to analyze and visualize. However, many source was data on cryptocurrency exchanges, in particular,
of the visualization techniques we surveyed can apply with to describe conversion rates of a cryptocurrency value to a
modification to private and consortium blockchains as the government-backed currency, such as the exchange rate of
underlying technological concepts are often similar. Bitcoin to US Dollar.
5.2 Blockchain Data

5.3 Target Audience’s Levels of Analysis
We categorized seven different types of blockchain data that
We categorized three types of target audiences for blockchain
were represented:
visualization tools and visualizations communicated in data
Number of sources with different blockchain data analysis articles based on levels of analysis that audiences
Blockchain Network External demand to the tool:
Entities Nodes Mining
Components Activities Data
56 16 11 15 27 18 Number of sources for different target audiences
Novices Intermediates Experts
The most common category of data visualized was 16 30 30
blockchain components (74%). Blockchain components are
fundamental data types stored in public ledgers, including The majority of existing blockchain visualizations were
transactions, addresses, and blocks. Entities data require pre- targeted at users required for analyses at intermediate or
computation to identify blockchain users from anonymous expert levels. Sources for intermediate users (39%) aimed
addresses and was used in 21% of all sources. for active blockchain users such as miners, cryptocurrency
Nodes play an important role in the blockchain network. traders, or enthusiasts who may be interested in monitoring
However, node information was only presented in 14% of our blockchain activities or look at individual transactions or
sources. Nodes ensure consensus through mining, to verify blocks. Among those sources, only two visualization articles
transactions and store them in the public ledger. Statistics of targeted this audience.
mining activity was presented in 20% of our sources. The Sources for blockchain experts (39%), such as economists
data can be directly calculated from the blockchain such as, or fraud investigators, targeted users who may perform
for Bitcoin, the average miner’s speed to solve the proof-of- in-depth analyses of activities on the blockchain. Sources
work problem (hash rate), mining difficulties over time, and for experts commonly allowed the flexible investigation of
the amount of reward to the successful miners. data at multiple levels of scale (from individual transactions
Network activities information were the second most to network activities) and using multiple (potentially pre-
common data source (36%)—usually displayed using ag- computed) dimensions of data. All data analysis articles
gregated statistics describing the whole network. Network (17 sources) presented analyses of blockchain networks
activity data usually included time-based data on the number using specific calculated measures, such as the growth of
of unique addresses used, the total number of transactions blockchain adoption, the degree of connectivity between
recorded in a given time period, the number of transactions entities, or the centrality of entities in the transaction network.
waiting to be confirmed (mempool), and the number of On the other hand, most visualization articles (12 out of
unspent transaction outputs (UTXOs). 14 sources) proposed interactive systems that allow data
External data appeared in 24% of all sources to convey analysis experts to engage in exploratory analysis; while the
meaningful contexts such as cryptocurrency exchange rates, other two targeted intermediate users. We found only one
online source for expert users that allowed to track Bitcoin Cybercrime Detection: Cybercrime is a serious threat to
value movement. the use of blockchains. This task domain is particularly
Of the sources we found 21% targeted novice audiences— common for the cryptocurrency community because of
all were online sources aimed at casually informing curious the historic frequency of fraudulent activities (e.g., money
visitors about the Bitcoin blockchain. laundering and illegal trading) as well as cyberattacks (e.g.,
denial-of-service and Sybil attacks) on most cryptocurrency
blockchains.
5.4 Task Domains
We found a total of 12 sources that discussed work
We categorized our blockchain visualization tools and data
related to fraudulent activities in the network—4 analysis
analysis articles into six focus task domains: (1) transac-
articles focused on specific fraudulent events, such as laundry
tion detail analysis, (2) transaction network analysis, (3)
services, online drug market places, denial-of-service attacks,
cybercrime detection, (4) cryptocurrency exchange analysis,
and anonymity of users. Besides these, there were 7 visu-
(5) peer-to-peer (P2P) network activity analysis, and (6)
alization articles that proposed fraud detection tools while
casual/entertaining information communication. These task
only 1 online source allowed experts to investigate criminal
domains are not mutually exclusive but helped us to detect
activities in blockchains. All of the existing cybercrime
goals for the development, analysis, and exposure of existing
detection tools were designed to investigate cybercrime
tools.
and fraudulent activities after they occur. Therefore, we
Number of sources with different task domains still lack tools to monitor and automatically detect potential
Detail Network Cybercrime Exchanges P2P Casual cybercrime activities in real-time.
24 24 12 10 27 12
Cryptocurrency Exchanges Analysis: Cryptocurrency ex-
P2P network analysis (36%) was the most common task changes are an important target domain particularly to
domain we found in blockchain visualization tools, followed cryptocurrency blockchains such as Bitcoin. Tools in this
by transaction detail analysis (32%), and transaction network target domain present exchange market statistics together
analysis (32%). We observed that cybercrime detection with financial data related to different cryptocurrencies, such
(16%) is a task domain focused on investigating fraudulent as the exchange rate between a cryptocurrency value to
activities and cyberattack events in the blockchain, but still the US Dollar. In contrast to the transaction detail analysis
largely missed in the existing sources. Moreover, we found task domain, tools that targeted cryptocurrency exchanges
visualizations for cryptocurrency exchange analysis (16%), focused on external data (mostly currency conversion rates
and for casual/entertaining information communication and trading volume) rather than looking at fine-grained
(13%). information on any specific transactions or their aggregation.
Transaction Detail Analysis: Transaction detail analysis In this review, we did not systematically collect all
tools often expose basic statistics on the level of individual tools that focused on market-related data without also
transactions, of blocks, and sometimes related to individ- including some data stored on a blockchain. Instead, we
ual blockchain users (entities) such as individual people, included 10 sources that visualize cryptocurrency exchange
exchange platforms, dark marketplaces, gambling services statistics together with blockchain data—9 online sources
or companies. and 1 visualization article. A comprehensive review of
Since the most common application context for online cryptocurrency exchange sources can be found in
blockchains currently is cryptocurrencies, it is not surprising our previous work [46].
that all 24 sources in this task domain had to do with the com-
P2P Network Activity Analysis: Several sources targeted
munication of basic information on financial transactions—17
peer-to-peer (P2P) network activity analysis. This target
online sources and 7 visualization articles.
domain concerns the presentation of aggregated statistics
Transaction Network Analysis: A blockchain transaction
that gives an overview of activities in the P2P network,
network is a bipartite graph connecting addresses through
such as mining, transaction rates, transaction volume, mem-
transactions. Half of the sources in this task domain were
pool statistics, sometimes coupled with inferred geographic
from data analysis articles (12 out of 24 sources). These
locations. We found a total of 22 interactive visualization
articles analyzed transaction networks and described the
tools—21 online sources and 1 visualization article—for
structures and dynamics of blockchain transaction networks.
analyzing P2P network activities. On the other hand, 5 anal-
These articles included visualizations that represented mea-
ysis articles presented longitudinal analyses of blockchain
sures calculated from the transaction network, such as
network characteristics. In contrast to transaction network
the number of addresses (node), and the distribution of
analysis domain, P2P network analysis focuses the entire
transactions received (in-degree) and sent (out-degree) over
P2P blockchain network, i.e. what is its state and how well
time.
does it work as a whole system.
Moreover, there were 7 visualization articles and 5 online
sources focused on visualizing large blockchain transaction Casual/Entertaining Information Communication: In addi-
networks. These also allowed for interactive exploration tion to the more serious analysis target domains outlined
of transaction networks based on specific events or group above, we also found 12 sources exclusively from the web
of entities. These tools generally did not report statistical that were built to attract the attention of novice audiences
network measures but focused on representing the variety to blockchain technologies and engage them through casual
or temporal dynamics of address connections. information visualization.
TABLE 1
Classification table of blockchain data visualization sources
Target Blockchain Data Audience Task Domain Visualization Type
P2P Network Activity Analysis

Transaction Network Analysis
Cryptoc. Exchange Analysis
Tree & Graph Visualizations

Transaction Detail Analysis
Map-based Visualizations
Blockchain Components
Casual Visualizations
Cybercrime Detection
Casual / Entertaining
External Data Source
Network Activities
MD Visualizations
Intermediates
Time Series
Ethereum
Novices
Entities
Bitcoin
Experts
Others
Mining
Charts
Nodes
Visualization Articles
[V1] Tendrils of Crime x x x x x x
[V2] BlockChainVis x x x x x x
[V3] Bogner x x x x x x x
[V4] Chawathe x x x x x
[V5] BitConeView x x x x x x
[V6] Bitcoin Entity Explorer x x x x x x
[V7] BitConduite x x x x x x x x
[V8] Blockchain Explorer x x x x x x x x
[V9] McGinn et al. 2016 x x x x x x x
[V10] Norvill et al. x x x x x
[V11] BiVA x x x x x x
[V12] Schretlen et al. x x x x x
[V13] BitVis x x x x x x x x
[V14] BitExTract x x x x x x x x x x
Total 12 2 0 13 5 0 1 1 1 0 2 12 7 7 7 0 1 0 2 7 10 3 0 0
Data Analysis Articles
[A1] Alqassem et al. x x x x x x x
[A2] Aw et al. x x x x x x x
[A3] Badev and Chen x x x x x x x x
[A4] de Balthasar et al. x x x x x x x
[A5] Bartoletti and Pompianu x x x x x x
[A6] Bistarelli et al. x x x x x
[A7] Chang and Svetinovic x x x x x x
[A8] Chen et al. x x x x x x
[A9] Di Battista et al. x x x x x x
[A10] Lischke and Fabian x x x x x x x x x x x x x
[A11] Maesa et al. x x x x x x
[A12] McGin et al. 2018 x x x x x x x
[A13] Meiklejohn et al. x x x x x x x x
[A14] Norbutas x x x x x x x
[A15] Parino et al. x x x x x x x x x
[A16] Reid and Harrigan x x x x x x x x
[A17] Ron and Shamir x x x x x x
Total 14 1 2 11 8 2 0 4 4 0 0 17 0 12 4 1 5 0 12 13 10 0 2 0
Online Sources
[O1] EthStats.io x x x x x x x x
[O2] Alethio x x x x x x
[O3] BitBonkers x x x x x
[O4] Bitcoin Globe x x x x x
[O5] BitcoinWisdom x x x x x x x x x
[O6] Etherchain x x x x x x x x x x
[O7] chainFlyer x x x x x x
[O8] BitForce5 x x x x x
[O9] BitInfoCharts x x x x x x x x x x x
[O10] Blockchain.info x x x x x x x x x x x x x x
[O11] Blockchair x x x x x x x x x x x
[O12] BlockSeer x x x x x
[O13] BTC.com x x x x x x x x x x x x x
[O14] Bitcoinity x x x x x x x x x
[O15] Coin Dance x x x x x x x x x
[O16] CoinDesk x x x x x x x x x
[O17] DailyBlockchain x x x x x
[O18] DashRadar x x x x x x x x x x x
[O19] The Bitcoin Big Bang x x x x x
[O20] ethernodes.org x x x x x x x x x
[O21] Etherscan x x x x x x x x x x x x x
[O22] EtherView x x x x x
[O23] Ethviewer x x x x x x
[O24] Ethplorer x x x x x x x
[O25] Plantoids x x x x x
[O26] Gastracker.io x x x x x x x x x
[O27] Interaqt x x x x x
[O28] Federal Bitcoin x x x x x
[O29] Johoe’s Mempool x x x x x x
[O30] Symphony of Blockchains x x x x x
[O31] OXT x x x x x x x x x x
[O32] Bitcoin Visuals x x x x x x x x x
[O33] BitListen x x x x x
[O34] BitcoinCity x x x x x
[O35] EthStats.net x x x x x x x x
[O36] Blockchain 3D Explorer x x x x x
[O37] Statoshi.info x x x x x x
[O38] On Brink x x x x x
[O39] TradeBlock x x x x x x x x x x x x
[O40] TX Highway x x x x x
[O41] Bitcoin Monitor x x x x x
[O42] Bitcoinrain x x x x x x
[O43] Bitcoin VR x x x x x
[O44] Wizbit x x x x x x
[O45] BitNodes x x x x x x
Total 34 16 8 32 3 9 14 22 13 16 28 1 17 5 1 9 21 12 17 20 9 2 8 12
Grand Total 60 19 10 56 16 11 15 27 18 16 30 30 24 24 12 10 27 12 31 40 29 5 10 12
5.5 Visualization Types

We analyzed visual encodings in blockchain visualization
tools and found six common visualization types:
Number of sources with different visualization types
Charts Time Series Graphs MD Vis Maps Casual
31 40 29 5 10 12
Time series (53%) were the main visualization type

Fig. 2. BitInfoChart [O9] shows the historical Bitcoin balance of an
for blockchain data, followed by basic charts (41%), and address in both Bitcoin currency and exchange rate to the US Dollar.
tree and graph visualizations (38%). This is not surpris-
ing because blockchain components contain time-stamped
information and addresses are connected via transactions sources—8 online sources and 2 data analysis articles. All
forming transaction networks. Other visualization types of these sources in our survey visualized thematic maps,
often showed blockchain data in a specific context. For showing statistical information about a blockchain related
example, map-based visualizations (13%) displayed global to geographic area. We found 3 point maps, 2 density
blockchain node distributions. We found casual information maps, 4 choropleth maps, and 2 virtual globes in 3D. For
visualizations (16%) only in casual/entertaining sources. example, Lischke and Fabian [A10] included 2 map-based
Multi-dimensional visualizations (7%) were used to encode visualizations: an area map and a choropleth map.
blockchain component data that contain multiple attributes. Casual Visualizations: We grouped a set of non-standard,
custom-made graphical representations of blockchain data as
Charts: Charts showed predominantly two or three (never
casual information visualizations [36]. All casual visualizations
four) data dimensions using basic representation types
came exclusively from 12 online sources. These sources did
such as bar charts, pie charts, histograms, scatterplots, and
not use common charts or plots as described above. Instead,
heatmaps. We counted basic charts with a time dimension
they depicted basic blockchain components in unique ways
as “time series” but found 31 sources that included basic
to attract attention. Visualizations used included 3D ani-
charts without a time dimension—17 online sources, 12 data
mated balls, 3D toy models of buildings and roads, or a
analysis articles, and 2 visualization articles.
flying balloon in a 360-degree view. We even found one data
Time Series: Time series were the most common visual-
physicalization project for blockchain data: [O25], [O38].
ization type because timestamps are an essential attribute
in blockchain data. We found 40 sources that had at least
one time series element—20 online sources, 13 data analysis 6 D ETAILED A NALYSIS PER TASK D OMAIN
articles, and 7 visualization articles. Most commonly time Since task domains are an important distinguishing factor
series showed the activity of a blockchain address or entity in our classification scheme, we describe patterns of sources
summarized across different time granularities. Time series for each task domain in greater detail. We highlight some
were often presented as line plots and bar graphs with a representative examples and discuss blockchain data and
temporal x-axis. We also found other visualization techniques visualization types that are commonly used in those sources.
for time-oriented data including tile maps [30], a heat map
with calendar divisions to encode activity statistics with one
or two temporal dimensions. 6.1 Transaction Detail Analysis
Tree and Graph Visualizations: Tree and graph visualiza- The main goal of transaction detail analysis is to analyze
tions were a common choice to represent money flows and transaction patterns for individual blockchain components
transaction networks in the sources we surveyed. These (i.e. transactions, addresses, and blocks) or derived entities in
representations typically showed the connection of transac- blockchain networks. We distinguish three types of transac-
tions from input addresses to output addresses. We found tion detail analyses based on the blockchain data visualized:
29 sources with trees or graphs—10 visualization articles, 10 (1) visualization of financial transactions, (2) visualization of
data analysis articles, and 9 online sources. Node-link diagrams blocks, and (3) visualization of multiple entities.
were the most common technique to show the connectivity of Visualization of financial transactions: Visualizations
blockchain components. A few sources used different graph of this category allow intermediate users to search and
visualization techniques, such as an adjacency matrix, a Circos explore the details of cryptocurrency value transactions,
diagram [27], or customized visualizations. addresses, and blocks, for example for the Bitcoin ([O7],
Multi-dimensional Visualizations: We refer to multi- [O9], [O10], [O11]), Ethereum ([O1], [O9], [O10], [O11], [O21],
dimensional visualizations as visualizations designed for [O24], [O26]), Litecoin ([O9], [O11]), and Dash ([O9], [O18])
showing data of higher dimensions than basic charts, includ- blockchains.
ing small-multiple glyphs, self-organizing maps, a classification Most tools in this task domain focus on representing
tree, a 3D scatterplot, spider charts, and a parallel corrdinates plot. financial transaction activities in a specific address or entity
We found only 5 sources in our survey that included multi- such as the total received, sent, or the balance amount
dimensional visualizations—3 visualization articles and 2 over time in the form of time series. BitInfoCharts [O9] is a
online sources. representative example in this category that uses line plot time
Map-based Visualizations: Map-based visualization was series to show the balance amount of individual addresses
a common technique to display geographical information for several cryptocurrencies, including a conversion rate to
associated with the blockchain. We found 10 different US Dollar (Fig. 2). Other time series visualizations have also
Fig. 5. OXT Landscapes [O31] provides an interactive 3D scatterplot

to explore attributes of all blocks in the Bitcoin blockchain. Each dot
represents a block in the Bitcoin blockchain in 3-dimensional space. Each
Fig. 3. Schretlen et al. [V12] proposed a tile map encoding which the dimension encodes an attribute describing the block, including block
authors later applied to the distribution of Bitcoin amount exchanged size, number of transactions, number of addresses in the block, or total
over time. The x-axis represents the time of transactions and the y-axis transaction fee.
represents the log10 Bitcoin amount. The frequency of transactions in
each value is encoded as the color scale. It is designed to help detect
outlier activities or interesting patterns for further investigation. (Image blocks as a node-link diagram (Fig. 4). OXT Landscapes [O31]
from a public presentation, used with permission of Uncharted Software is the only source that uses 3D visualization to represent
Inc.)
attributes of blocks as a 3D scatterplot (Fig. 5).
Visualization of multiple entities: We found 2 sources
that presented financial information of entities allowing
experts to explore single or a group of entities and drill
down to see transaction behavior: [V7], [V14]. Attributes that
characterize entities were usually represented using multi-
attribute visualizations.
BitConduite [V7] is a visual analytics tool for exploring
entities in Bitcoin using multiple views (Fig. 6). It allows
analysts to filter groups of entities visually from a classification
tree. The tool also clusters groups of entities that have
similar activity patterns, and encodes them as radar charts
to represent quantitative attributes of entities, such as the
number of transactions, time active, and the average number
of input addresses per transaction. BitExTract [V14] is another
Fig. 4. Ethviewer [O23] visualizes the Ethereum blockchain in real- visual analytics tool that also falls in the category of entity
time. Each circle represents a transaction in the mempool waiting to be visualizations, focusing on the analysis of activities among
collected in the block. The color encodes different types of transactions
Bitcoin exchanges, including transactional volume, market
and the size encodes the value associated with the transaction. When
the transactions are included in the block, the screen shows the animated share, and connectivity between exchanges. (Fig. 7 A, B, C).
circles moving to the box. The color of the box header changes from red
to green as the block is confirmed. At the top of the webpage, two pie
charts show information about gas associated with transactions. 6.2 Transaction Network Analysis
Transaction network analysis sources showed generally
three kinds of information: (1) transaction networks, (2) the
been used. Blockchain Explorer [V8], for example, visualizes network of entities, and (3) value flows tracing the transfer
weekly or monthly transaction volumes as a tile map [30]. of cryptocurrency values through transactions over time.
In contrast to most sources in this task domain that These sources were always represented as tree and network
show aggregated statistics on transactions and addresses, visualizations. In particular, node-link diagrams were most often
Schretlen et al. [V12] proposed an interactive visualization used to show the connectivity among blockchain components.
for exploratory analysis of transaction data stored in the A common technique to arrange nodes was the force-directed
Bitcoin blockchain. It used a large scale tile map (Fig. 3) to graph layout.
display the distribution of Bitcoin transaction values. A transaction network is a directed bipartite graph
Visualization of blocks: We found 3 sources that visual- connecting addresses via a transaction. There are two kinds of
ized the content of blocks: [V4], [V14], [O31]. Chawathe [V4] nodes: one type for addresses and one for transactions. Two
applied a self-organizing map to create a low-dimensional kinds of directed edges exist in such a graph. Input edges
representation of transactions in a block. The self-organizing connecting input address(es) to a transaction and output
map is visualized as a hexagonal grid of wind rose plots to edges connecting a transaction to output address(es).
show the main characteristics of transaction groups in a block. We found real-time transaction networks in three online
Another tool, Ethviewer [O23], shows the real-time transac- visualization tools: [O8], [O17], [O18]. For example, Daily-
tion pool in Ethereum. The tool shows a chain of linked Blockchain [O17] shows a live Bitcoin transaction network
Fig. 7. BitExTract [V14] is a multiple-view visual analytics tool to compare

the transaction activities and relationships of Bitcoin exchange entities.
(A) The comparison view is an interactive parallel coordinates plot to
compare financial activities of Bitcoin exchanges ordered by user-defined
ranks (rows in each bar) over months (axes). (B) The exchanges list
view displays transactional volumes of Bitcoin exchanges over months
as a time series bar chart. (C) The massive sequence view uses a heat
map-like representation to show the transaction surplus of exchanges
through their entire history of those entities. (D) The connection view is
a node-link diagram encoding the volume of transactional exchanges.
Each node is sorted and colored based on the continent of origin of the
exchange. The edge thickness shows the intensity of activities between
two exchange nodes. The view becomes an ego-network graph when
analysts drag the exchange node of their interest into the center of the
network.
Fig. 6. BitConduite [V7] is a tool to analyze entity groups for the Bitcoin
blockchain. (A) The filter view provides a time series and multiple
histograms to filter Bitcoin entities. (B) The tree view is a classification
tree used to show the result of applied filters. (C) After that, entities are
clustered into groups. Averages of each metric visualized as star glyphs.
(D) Entities in a selected group are presented as glyphs encoding their
attributes. (E) Data analysis experts can select an entity and explore its
activity timeline. Fig. 8. BlockchainVis [V2] allows for creating transaction networks and
analyzing the connectivity of transaction exchanges in Bitcoin. The tool
provides a filter panel that allows analysts to filter out unimportant nodes
from the graph based on block height, transaction value, and address
where the nodes evolve over time. Users can zoom into and
balance.
hover over nodes to see additional information. However, the
transaction network is growing over time which decreases
the performance of the graph rendering. Bitforce5 [O8], in is an exception in that it presents a transaction activity
contrast, only shows a limited number of the most recent timeline of a chosen entity with a timeline-based squarified
transactions. Therefore the performance remains the same graph layout connecting input and output addresses over
over time. time (Fig. 9).
Several visualization articles proposed tools to explore A network of entities shows the connectivity between
transaction networks based on specific events: [V2], [V6], entities in the blockchain network: [V14], [A15], [O19]. Nodes
[V9], [O36]. The BlockchainVis [V2] tool displays a fully represent entities and edges represent connectivity through
connected transaction network of a transaction or an address transactions. For example in Bitcoin, an edge represents the
entered by the user (Fig. 8). McGinn et al. [V9] proposed a total amount of exchanged values between two entities and
system to display a transaction network on a large screen on is absent if no value was exchanged.
which users can pan, zoom, and hover over to get a better The Bitcoin Big Bang [O19] is an online visualization
overview or more detail. Blockchain 3D Explorer [O36] is the presenting a network of entities as a node-link diagram con-
only tool in this domain that visualizes a transaction network necting well-known wallets and highlighting the transaction
as a 3D graph. It also supports virtual reality systems for volume between them. The color of nodes represents the type
Google Cardboard to explore the blockchain network in of nodes, such as payment processors, dark marketplaces,
an immersive way. Instead of showing a static transaction and gambling services. It adds a temporal dimension to the
network as a node-link diagram, Bitcoin Entity Explorer [V6] node-link diagram by arranging the node distance from
Fig. 11. Blockchain.info [O10] visualizes the flow of Bitcoin money as a

tree graph. The size of the nodes is proportional to the total value sent or
received from an input or output address.
Fig. 9. The Bitcoin Blockchain Entity Explorer [V6] shows a transaction
activity timeline of addresses that likely belong to the same entity. The
timeline shows an entity’s list of sending and receiving addresses that
are involved in transactions and highlights the sending and receiving
activities with glyphs that encode transfer amount and direction. This
figure shows the activity of a Bitcoin miner who combines 20 mining
transactions and sends the combined value to two output addresses.
Green addresses on the left likely all belong to the same miner.
Fig. 12. BitConeView [V5] is a graphical tool to analyze the pattern

of Bitcoin value flows over time by means of transactions. Each block
contains spending transactions in the upper bar and unspent transaction
output (UTXOs) in the lower bar. The width of each bar indicates the
amount of a transaction. (© 2015, IEEE)
commonly saw it represented as a tree diagram connecting the

flow of values in chronological order. In this layout, a node
Fig. 10. Parino et al. [A15] present the movement of Bitcoin value among represents a transaction or address and an edge represents
countries in 2013 as a Circos diagram. The flow of transaction exchanges the amount of value exchanged. We found 6 sources that
is a ribbon in which the size is proportional to the amount transferred visualized value flows: [V1], [V5], [V13], [A17], [O10], [O12].
between the two countries. The external circle shows the total sending
and receiving money for each country. (CC BY 4.0)
For example, Blockchain.info [O10] provides a tree diagram
in which users can click through tree levels to follow value
flow from connected input and output addresses (Fig. 11).
the center based on the time of their first appearance. Instead of presenting the value flow as a tree structure,
Users can select a node to highlight the transaction flow BitConeView [V5] provides a unique diagram showing the
on that node. BitExTract [V14] has a connection view that value flow of a seed transaction as it appears in blocks from
shows the relationship of exchange entities using a circular top to bottom (Fig. 12).
network layout to investigate the interaction of entities in the All of the examples above present static graphs that do
blockchain network (Fig. 7 D). Parino et al. [A15] describe not consider the timestamp of transactions. We found a
a flow network of Bitcoin transactions aggregated at the unique value flow graph in BitInfoCharts [O9] that visu-
country-level. The authors use a Circos diagram [27], also alizes the flow of transactions over the entire history of a
known as dependency wheel, to visualize the total transaction cryptocurrency blockchain (Fig. 13) as a kind of node-link
exchanged between major countries (Fig. 10). diagram arranged using a linear layout. The same kind of
A value flow presents traces of cryptocurrency value graph also appeared in McGinn et al. [A12] as an adjacency
given a particular transaction or address of interest. We most matrix representation.
Fig. 13. The Bitcoin visualization in BitInfoCharts [O9] shows the trans-
action exchanges network between blocks for the entire Bitcoin network.
The graph uses a linear graph layout to display the evolution of block
height on the x-axis. The edges encode the total value of transaction Fig. 14. McGinn et al. [V9] displayed transaction networks during
outputs in a block that has been spent in the next blocks. Additional transaction rate attack incidents in the Bitcoin network at block heights
line and bar charts are added to show descriptive information on the 364133 (left) and 364618 (right). (CC BY 4.0)
blockchain including price, hash rate, and the number of transactions.
6.3 Cybercrime Detection

The cybercrime detection task domain includes tools that are
able to detect suspicious transactions and entities or inves-
tigate cyber-attack events. Sources in this task domain also
include shared characteristics with sources in the transaction
detail analysis and transaction network analysis domains, but
additionally, have very specific user tasks and subsequently
focused features for cybercrime detection. Current blockchain Fig. 15. Blockchain.info [O10] provides a candlestick chart displaying the
visualization tools for cybercrime detection focus on two historical price of cryptocurrency exchanges.
questions: (1) value flow analysis to see how cryptocurrency
value is propagated and (2) transaction network analysis
to see how the blockchain network reacted in light of BlockChainVis tool [V2] is another transaction network
cybercrime events. tool that allows to filter specific parts of the transaction
One way to detect fraudulent financial activities in cryp- network during an event of interest (Fig. 8). It has been
tocurrency blockchains is to analyze value flows. Exemplary used to analyze the WannaCry ransomware incident on May
tools dedicated to in-depth value flow analysis: [V1], [V5], 12th, 2017 [A6]. Other data analysis articles performed ad-
[V13], [O12]. BlockSeer [O12] is an online money flow hoc analyses of transaction networks during attacks on the
analytical tool that allows blockchain experts to construct Bitcoin network, including money laundry services [A4],
a deep transaction flow graph to trace money laundering online drug marketplaces [A14], and the network of Bitcoin
and stolen Bitcoins. Di Battista et al. [V5] and Ahmed thefts [A16].
et al. [V1] proposed transaction graph construction tools
dedicated to analyzing the mix of Bitcoin stolen money in 6.4 Cryptocurrency Exchange Analysis
the transaction flow (i.e. taint analysis). To analyze the degree Cryptocurrency exchanges convert cryptocurrency values
of money mixing from the original transaction, Di Battista into real-world currencies, such as US Dollars. As such, much
et al. [V5] introduced a purity measurement, the degree that of the data related to these exchanges is not stored on the
a seed transaction is mixed with other transactions. Ahmed blockchain itself. Our analysis of cryptocurrency exchange
et al. [V1] use a First-In-First-Out (FIFO) algorithm to track data is limited to those sources that relate any externally
the diffusion of tainted transactions in both forward (i.e. captured data to data stored on the blockchain. Our sources
starting from a stolen coin to the following transactions) or in this task domain either (1) cover the conversion of cryp-
backward (i.e. tracing the previous transactions until the tocurrency value to US Dollar for blockchain components
origin of a tainted coin is found) directions. The authors such as individual addresses or blocks (see Sect. 6.1) or
developed an interactive visualization tool to display taint (2) provide an additional view that relates information on
propagation as a node-link tree visualization. blockchain components to market statistics, such as historical
We also found visualization sources for transaction price, trading volume, and market capitalization. A market
network analysis on specific events or group of entities: statistics view informs intermediate and expert users about
[V2], [V9], [V11], [V13], [A4], [A6], [A12], [A14], [A16]. For blockchain value in the external environment, for example,
example, BitVis [V13] uses multiple graph visualizations with as converted to US Dollar or Euro. Market statistics can help
a filtering panel to display transaction networks for detecting to understand how the mechanisms inside the blockchain
abnormal and suspicious Bitcoin entities. Two articles from network are affected by the cryptocurrency economy at large.
McGinn et al. [V9], [A12] show how their tool can be used to As already described in the “transaction detail analy-
visualize a transaction network during cybercrime attacks, sis” task domain section (Sect. 6.1), a first type of source
including denial-of-service attacks where an attacker tries visualizes conversion rates for cryptocurrency values: [O6],
to fill up a block with spam transactions (Fig. 14). The [O9], [O10], [O21]. The second type of sources visualizes
Fig. 16. The Crypto-Economics Explorer in CoinDesk [O16] provides a

Fig. 18. EthStats.net [O35] provides a real-time dashboard to monitor
comparison view of multiple market measures for different blockchains.
Ethereum network status.
Fig. 17. Blockchain.info [O10] provides time series charts to show Fig. 19. BitNodes [O45] shows the geographical distribution of the number
aggregated statistics of the Bitcoin network. This example shows the of active Bitcoin nodes in a point map. The number of nodes in each
hash rate of Bitcoin over time. The number of nodes in each clustered clustered location is encoded as the bubble size.
location is encoded as the bubble size.
over time. For example, Blockchain.info [O10] provides a

market statistics: [O10], [O16], [O21]. These sources mostly
long list of time series charts to display a wide range of
used time series to display the historical exchange rate and
Bitcoin network statistics, for example, the total hash rate
market volume for different time scales (i.e. hours, days,
(Fig. 17), average block size, total transaction fee, and mining
weeks, months) in addition to more detailed information on
difficulty. A dashboard proposed by Bogner [V3] presents
individual transactions, addresses or blocks. For example,
time series and basic charts on Ethereum statistics and
Blockchain.info [O10] provides a market view for various
highlights outlier data using anomaly detection techniques.
cryptocurrencies (Fig. 15). CoinDesk [O16] is a unique online
EthStats.net [O35] is a rare example that provides a real-time
tool in this category that shows summarized measures of the
dashboard for monitoring network status and active nodes
size and investment opportunities of several cryptocurren-
in the Ethereum blockchain (Fig. 18).
cies. It presents a spider chart to compare multiple measures
Analyzing the global distribution of a blockchain net-
related to price, exchanges, social media, developers, and the
work involves observing the density of blockchain nodes and
overall network size (Fig. 16).
transactions around the world. Public blockchain data does
not inherently include geographic information about senders,
6.5 P2P Network Activity Analysis receivers, or blockchain nodes. However, when nodes in the
Blockchains are decentralized systems running with client blockchain network have associated IP addresses, these can
nodes in a peer-to-peer (P2P) network architecture. Un- be used to infer the geographic location of a node with a
derstanding the activities within the P2P network helps degree of uncertainty [7], [23]. The geographic origin of a
intermediate and expert users to track the current status transaction can then be inferred from the IP address of the
of a block as a result of overall activities among participants first node that relayed it [25], [39].
in the network. Sources in this task domain use two kinds of We found 9 sources that display the number of nodes
visualizations: (1) time series to show the aggregated statistics active in the blockchain P2P network ([A10], [A15], [O18],
of the P2P network, and (2) map-based visualizations to show [O20], [O21], [O35], [O45]), and transaction origins ([A10],
the geographical distribution of blockchain usage around the [O4], [O44]). All of them display geography information in
world. map-based visualizations—the only task domain that used this
Most sources in this task domain present P2P network kind of visualization type. For example, BitNodes [O45]
statistics, calculated from aggregated node activities in the implemented a node crawler to gather reachable node
blockchain network over time. All sources use time series locations to estimate the global distribution of Bitcoin nodes
visualizations to represent changes of the blockchain network (Fig. 19). Different types of map-based visualizations we saw
are discussed in Sect. 5.5. 7.2 Blockchain Analysis vs. Visual Analytics
In our survey, we covered visualizations published as part
of blockchain analysis articles—for which conveying the
6.6 Casual/Entertaining Information Communication result of the analysis and not the design of visualizations
were the focus. As such, visualizations in the analysis
Sources in this task domain generally provided original and
articles were meant for communication of scientific results
experimental visualization of blockchain components that
rather than exploration. Most analysis articles focused on
are distinct from any of the ones used for the above task
transaction network analysis—indicating a current research
domains. Our sources encoded, for example, attributes of
focus for which, according to our survey, few tools exist
transactions and blocks as custom objects—often in 3D—with
that experts could make use of. As a result, most analysis
animation and real-time updates.
articles only showed time series plots or basic charts of
To show the wide variety of visual encodings in this
network measures. In addition, we observed that blockchain
category we briefly discuss a few examples: BitBonkers [O3]
analysis articles often did not conduct an in-depth analysis
shows live Bitcoin transactions as 3D balls falling on a
of the entire blockchain, probably because of the large size
plate each time a new transaction is broadcasted to the
of the blockchain and the lack of simple ways to explore
network. BitcoinCity [O34] represents Bitcoin transactions
and statistically analyze the data in its entirety. Blockchain
as 3D toy models of buildings along the road that are
analysis articles often focused on a higher-level data analysis
moving as new transactions are created. BitListen [O33]
of the blockchain network (i.e. the global blockchain network
presents transactions as animated bubbles floating on the
or longitudinal study of P2P network analysis). Considering
screen, producing notes that combine into improvised music.
the demand of data analysis experts and decision-makers
Symphony of Blockchains [O30] includes a combination of
to better understand blockchain activities, it would be an
interactive visual representation of Bitcoin data that allows
opportunity for the VA community to come forward with
web visitors to browse blocks as a 3D visual representation
more advanced tools that support both higher-level and
and navigate through a flight-simulator mode, along with
more in-depth analyses of blockchain data. The growing size
background audio representing the network hash rate and
and dynamic nature of blockchains require techniques that
using a unique tone for each of the transactions in the block.
work on multiple levels of data aggregation and show data
Bitcoin VR [O43] is an open-source project that visualizes
updates well. Tools also need to provide complete overviews
Bitcoin transactions as balloons flying over a 360-degree
of the network and also allow experts to interactively drill-
view.
down and see close details of transactions or individual
actors on the network. In particular, tools that allow experts
to take on specific viewpoints such as individual entities
7 D ISCUSSIONS AND O PEN C HALLENGES in the network (e.g., people, enterprises, miners), historic
events (e.g., cyber-attacks), or network-related events (e.g.,
This section reports general observations that we gathered halving days or forks) are still missing. Finally, there is a lack
while compiling this survey about blockchain data visualiza- of tools tailored to the specific needs of particular experts, in
tion. In particular, we discuss the state-of-the-art of existing particular economists and blockchain managers. Economists
visualization practice in regards to blockchains as well as want to understand the activities on the blockchains and
opportunities for future research. compare them with related economic activities in the real
world. Consortium blockchain managers need to understand
e.g., how their blockchain evolves, according to their plans
7.1 Blockchain Visualization: Research vs. Practice and how it compares to other blockchains.
Blockchain enthusiasts and startups have quickly established

the need to better communicate what happens in and 7.3 The Dominance of Cryptocurrency Blockchains
around blockchains. In our survey, online sources that use Cryptocurrencies are the most widely used applications
visualizations outnumber by far dedicated visualization of blockchains nowadays. All visualization sources we
articles that describe how to visualize blockchain data for found addressed cryptocurrency blockchains. Most sources
various types of tasks. Yet, most online sources only use and visualized Bitcoin data since it is well-known, adopted, and
require simple charts or time series visualizations, where has a high number of users. The second most frequently
research input might not necessarily be required. Where visualized blockchain is Ethereum. All Ethereum-related
research can contribute the most is by offering systems for visualizations focus on the cryptocurrency aspect of value
in-depth analysis and this is, indeed, what most current exchanges among entities, not the smart contract function-
visualization articles focus on. Yet, we also see opportunities ality that makes Ethereum different from Bitcoin. We did
for research to offer more fluid interaction and exploration not find any source dedicated to other blockchain types,
capabilities, in particular for those online sources that offer including consortium and private blockchains. Even though
simple graph visualizations and explorations across time. In the concept of cryptocurrency blockchain sources should be
particular, we saw a need for interactive tools that allow users able to apply to other blockchains, there are some differences
to explore how their activities manifest on the blockchain in the detailed mechanism (e.g., the transaction data structure
and to show what data can or could be inferred about them and mining protocol) that need to be considered in the design
through their blockchain use. This could in particular help of visualization systems. The visualization of private and con-
novices assess and adjust their transaction patterns. sortium blockchains, or blockchains for non-cryptocurrency
use cases such as in healthcare [26], mobility [18], supply provide many single view charts showing a particular
chain management [38], or for government services [47] are blockchain measure over time. Single disconnected views
fruitful areas for future works. make it difficult to relate multiple blockchain characteristics
to each other. BitExTract [O23] is one example that broke
7.4 The Missing Context of Blockchain Data the trend and proposes a dashboard with multiple chart
elements for analyzing transaction activities among Bitcoin
The majority of visualization sources presented detail about
exchange entities. Yet, additional sophisticated interaction
blockchain components and overviews of network activities
techniques for visual comparison [17] would help to connect
in the transaction detail analysis and P2P network analysis
views and generate more comprehensive insights.
task domains. What is missing in most sources is information
New visual representations for transaction network
that provides context for monitoring and analysis of activities
analysis: Existing network visualization sources present
in the blockchain, including the identification of entities,
transaction networks and value flows as static graphs at
geographic information, social network activity, or historic
specific points of interest (i.e. a point in time, a specific block,
events.
or for a group of entities). However, those tools mostly do not
In the big cryptocurrency blockchains, users remain
consider the temporal evolution of the network and, in par-
anonymous by using multiple non-identifiable addresses
ticular, changes of blockchain connectivity over time; we saw
to send and receive cryptocurrency value. Identity is only
no dynamic network visualizations [6]. Besides, blockchain
revealed if people or enterprises post their addresses openly
networks have specific network properties which could
and connect them to other pieces of identification, such
benefit from dedicated network layouts. For example, they
as forum user names, their websites, etc. If one wants to
are directed and time-oriented. For Bitcoin, the addresses can
understand how cryptocurrencies are used in regards to what
be clustered and so the raw graph can be simplified using
is known about fiat currencies, information about which ad-
well-known heuristics [20], leading to simpler visualizations.
dresses belong to the same entities (such as individual users,
Uncertainty visualization: Much of the contextual infor-
businesses receiving Bitcoin for payment, or exchanges) is
mation related to Bitcoin comes with a degree of uncertainty.
required. Heuristics exist that help to cluster addresses and
For example, heuristics to cluster Bitcoin entities are not
identify entities with a degree of uncertainty [37] but entity-
sure to capture Bitcoin entities with 100% accuracy and IP-
based visualizations are, nevertheless, rare (e.g., [V7], [V14],
addresses of nodes in the P2P network are not necessarily
[O10]).
reliable indicators of the geographic location of a node. In
The blockchain network involves many anonymous
addition, analysis tools that may label certain transaction
participants interacting with each other through committing
patterns as fraudulent or belonging to certain services (e.g.,
and validating transactions in the P2P network. It would be
exchanges, mixing services, etc.) may make false predictions.
interesting to study the collective activities of participants
Any uncertainty in the data should be made evident in the
in the blockchain network in light of historical events,
visualization [29] [35] and expose where viewers should be
such as from volatility of market prices, cyber-attacks (e.g.,
cautious about inferring insights and making decisions on
Mt. Gox hack, Bitcoin theft, and denial-of-service attacks),
the data.
government regulation, or changing in mining rewards.
Progressive visual analytics: Exploring Blockchain data
The existing visualization sources have been used mostly
involves navigating over large amounts of data for comput-
for dedicated task domain (i.e. transaction detail analysis,
ing aggregated values on selections of the transactions or
transaction network analysis, or P2P network analysis)
over time windows. These operations are usually simple
without providing the capability to investigate historical
to compute but take a long time. Work shown in research
events in a holistic view.
articles usually does computation offline to allow visual-
ization tools to remain interactive. However, doing the
7.5 Open Blockchain Visualization Challenges operations offline means that the data exploration is limited
Blockchain technology produces a large transactional dataset, to pre-computed values, and all the interactive tools we
rich in details, including sophisticated maintenance mech- reviewed were limited in that respect. For continuously
anisms which are interesting for analysis. The complexity computing derived data when the Blockchain evolves, for
of working with blockchain data comes both from both e.g., maintaining the clustered Bitcoin entities up-to-date,
technical aspects and its social component related to many techniques inspired by Boukhelifa et al. [9] could be applied.
social networks in general. Blockchain data is more complex To allow more open-ended explorations on Bitcoin data,
than most social networks due to its pseudonymous use of novel tools could rely on progressive data analysis and
addresses and the nature of the data is carries, usually mon- visualization [16], [40]. For example, Kinkeldey et al. report
etary value. Therefore, it is unlikely that simple views will that BitConduite [V7] provides dynamic queries on time
ever be able to convey the richness of information it carries. and attribute values to visualize aggregated information
Most visualization sources we surveyed focused on using about Bitcoin transactions, but each filter operations make
common chart types (i.e. time series and basic charts) with take a minute or so to complete depending on the amount of
basic interaction techniques (i.e. querying and zooming), that loaded data. Performing these operations progressively using
are not sufficient for advanced analysis tasks. Here we list methods reported by Moritz et al. [31] would drastically
several opportunities to improve existing visualizations used reduce the interactive latency and greatly improve the
and opportunities to develop new dedicated representations. efficiency of exploring Bitcoin data, and could perhaps even
Multiple views visualization of blockchain data: cope with the complete Bitcoin blockchain data.
Sources from data analysis articles and online sources usually Evaluation: In our survey, we found that 9 out of 14
visualization articles evaluated the usability of their tools by blockchains in recent years, the need for more VA tools
either demonstrating case studies ([V2], [V8], [V9], [V11], will grow and we outline several fruitful opportunities
[V13], [V14]) or performing user evaluation ([V5], [V7], for research on blockchain visual analytics. Application
[V9]). The fact that the majority of Bitcoin visualizations areas include the exploration and monitoring of activities
are published without formal task analyses or evaluation in the blockchain network and more advanced tools for
(at least as evident for research articles), is a clear sign understanding different uses for blockchains.
that more visualization research is needed in this domain.
This could be achieved by providing easier research access
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
to updated blockchain data or developing easy to deploy
analysis infrastructures. Some work in this direction has been This research work has been carried out under the leader-
started with e.g., BlockchainDB [21] and BlockSci [24] but ship of the Institute for Technological Research SystemX, and
will need further development to become usable on visual therefore granted with public funds within the scope of the
analytics infrastructures. This would allow researchers on French Program Investissements d’Avenir.
Bitcoin analysis tools to focus on designing analysis tools
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Available: http://www.ethviewer.live/.
Nicolas Heulot is a research engineer at Insti-

tute for Technological Research SystemX, France.
He recevied the Ph.D. in Computer Science from
University of Paris-Sud, France in 2014. His
main research areas are Visual Analytics and
Blockchain.
Jean-Daniel Fekete is the scientific leader of

the Inria project team Aviz that he founded in
2007. He received the Ph.D. in Computer Science
in 1996 from University of Paris-Sud, France,
joined Inria in 2002 as a confirmed researcher,
and became senior research scientist in 2006.
His main research areas are Visual Analytics,
Information Visualization and Human-Computer
Interaction. He is a Senior Member of IEEE.
Petra Isenberg is a research scientist at Inria,

France in the Aviz team. She received her PhD in
Computer Science from the University of Calgary
in 2010. Her main research areas are information
visualization and visual analytics with a focus
on collaborative work scenarios, interaction, and
evaluation.

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Visualization of Blockchain Data: A Systematic Review

Natkamon Tovanich, Nicolas Heulot, Jean-Daniel Fekete, Petra Isenberg

To cite this version:

HAL Id: hal-02426339

HAL is a multi-disciplinary open access L’archive ouverte pluridisciplinaire HAL, est

Visualization of Blockchain Data:

4.2 Searching academic articles 5 C LASSIFICATION S CHEME AND M ETHODOLOGY

Classiﬁcation Scheme of Visualization on Blockchain Data

Bitcoin Blockchain components Novices Transaction detail analysis Charts

5.2 Blockchain Data

Target Blockchain Data Audience Task Domain Visualization Type

P2P Network Activity Analysis

Cryptoc. Exchange Analysis

Tree & Graph Visualizations

5.5 Visualization Types

Time series (53%) were the main visualization type

Fig. 5. OXT Landscapes [O31] provides an interactive 3D scatterplot

Fig. 7. BitExTract [V14] is a multiple-view visual analytics tool to compare

Fig. 11. Blockchain.info [O10] visualizes the flow of Bitcoin money as a

Fig. 12. BitConeView [V5] is a graphical tool to analyze the pattern

commonly saw it represented as a tree diagram connecting the

6.3 Cybercrime Detection

Fig. 16. The Crypto-Economics Explorer in CoinDesk [O16] provides a

over time. For example, Blockchain.info [O10] provides a

Blockchain enthusiasts and startups have quickly established

DATA A NALYSIS A RTICLES

Nicolas Heulot is a research engineer at Insti-

Jean-Daniel Fekete is the scientific leader of

Petra Isenberg is a research scientist at Inria,

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