Understanding Cybersecurity for Smart Contracts: Challenges, Strategies, and Trends

This book provides a comprehensive introduction to the cybersecurity challenges associated with blockchain-based smart contracts and the rapidly growing decentralized ecosystem. It begins by explaining the foundations of blockchain technology, the evolution and lifecycle of smart contracts, and the programming languages and platforms used to develop them. This book also explores how smart contracts are designed, deployed, and used in real-world applications, highlighting their benefits and the security risks that arise from the automated, immutable execution of code in decentralized systems.  Building on this foundation, this book examines the major vulnerabilities, attack vectors, and threats targeting smart contracts, including execution manipulation, access-control flaws, and economic exploits. It also reviews existing analysis tools, vulnerability-detection techniques, and defensive strategies, including secure coding practices, formal verification, runtime monitoring, and governance mechanisms. By integrating theoretical concepts, practical tools, and recent research developments, this professional book provides researchers, developers, and cybersecurity professionals with a structured understanding of smart contract security. It also includes emerging challenges and future directions in this rapidly evolving field.