Evaluation of the Masked Logic Style MDPL on a Prototype Chip

  • Authors:
  • Thomas Popp;Mario Kirschbaum;Thomas Zefferer;Stefan Mangard

  • Affiliations:
  • Institute for Applied Information Processing and Communications (IAIK), Graz University of Technology, Inffeldgasse 16a, 8010 Graz, Austria;Institute for Applied Information Processing and Communications (IAIK), Graz University of Technology, Inffeldgasse 16a, 8010 Graz, Austria;Institute for Applied Information Processing and Communications (IAIK), Graz University of Technology, Inffeldgasse 16a, 8010 Graz, Austria;Infineon Technologies AG, Security Innovation, Am Campeon 1-12, 85579 Neubiberg, Germany

  • Venue:
  • CHES '07 Proceedings of the 9th international workshop on Cryptographic Hardware and Embedded Systems
  • Year:
  • 2007

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Abstract

MDPL has been proposed as a masked logic style that counteracts DPA attacks. Recently, it has been shown that the so-called "early propagation effect" might reduce the security of this logic style significantly. In the light of these findings, a 0.13 μmprototype chip that includes the implementation of an 8051-compatible microcontroller in MDPL has been analyzed. Attacks on the measured power traces of this implementation show a severe DPA leakage. In this paper, the results of a detailed analysis of the reasons for this leakage are presented. Furthermore, a proposal is made on how to improve MDPL with respect to the identified problems.