Securely sealing Multi-FPGA systems

  • Authors:
  • Tim Güneysu;Igor Markov;André Weimerskirch

  • Affiliations:
  • Horst Görtz Institute for IT-Security, Ruhr-University, Bochum, Germany;University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI;ESCRYPT Inc., Ann Arbor, MI

  • Venue:
  • ARC'12 Proceedings of the 8th international conference on Reconfigurable Computing: architectures, tools and applications
  • Year:
  • 2012

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Abstract

The importance of hardware security of electronic systems is rapidly increasing due to (1) the increasing reliance of mass-produced and mission-critical systems on embedded electronics, and (2) the ever-growing supply chains that disentangle chip designers and manufacturers from OEMs. Our work shows how to dramatically reduce vulnerability to Trojan-horse injection and in-field component replacement. We propose methods to verify the authenticity and integrity of an FPGA configuration during startup and at runtime. We also developed efficient protocols for electronic sealing of a multi-FPGA system, which automatically enforces the system configuration detected upon power-up and bans further modifications.