Standard cell camouflage method to counter silicon reverse engineering

Gomez, Hector; Duran, Ckristian; Roa, Elkim

doi:10.1109/icce.2018.8326300

“…They are applied to impair the effectiveness of the RE at all three levels of the RE framework; however, here we introduce solely a couple of them, being within the scope of our paper. Several techniques that counter RE at the image acquisition phase rely on obfuscation of key visual information or addition of unwanted information to make RE more tedious [101,102,103]. For instance, the method discussed in [104] relies on the insertion of dummy logic cells on the unused silicon substrate in the design of the IC.…”

Section: Counter Reverse Engineeringmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hardware Trust and Assurance through Reverse Engineering: A Survey and Outlook from Image Analysis and Machine Learning Perspectives

Botero,

Wilson,

Lu

et al. 2020

Preprint

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In the context of hardware trust and assurance, reverse engineering has been often considered as an illegal action. Generally speaking, reverse engineering aims to retrieve information from a product, i.e., integrated circuits (ICs) and printed circuit boards (PCBs) in hardware security-related scenarios, in the hope of understanding the functionality of the device and determining its constituent components. Hence, it can raise serious issues concerning Intellectual Property (IP) infringement, the (in)effectiveness of security-related measures, and even new opportunities for injecting hardware Trojans. Ironically, reverse engineering can enable IP owners to verify and validate the design. Nevertheless, this cannot be achieved without overcoming numerous obstacles that limit successful outcomes of the reverse engineering process. This paper surveys these challenges from two complementary perspectives: image processing and machine learning. These two fields of study form a firm basis for the enhancement of efficiency and accuracy of reverse engineering processes for both PCBs and ICs. In summary, therefore, this paper presents a roadmap indicating clearly the actions to be taken to fulfill hardware trust and assurance objectives. 1

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“…In [4] time delay was randomized to obfuscate the gate-level functions being performed. In [5] and [6] the authors introduced threshold voltage defined (TVD) logic families which used transistors with different threshold voltage levels to create logic gates that camouflaged the functionality of the IC/IP.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pass Gate Based Threshold Voltage Defined Logic Family with Resilience Against Hardware Attacks

Thomas¹,

Park²,

Maghari³

2023

Preprint

0

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<p>Electronic counterfeiting is a major source of concern from a security and reliability standpoint. For digital integrated circuits (ICs), reverse engineering can reveal the design and functionality of the circuit. A solution to this problem is to leverage different threshold voltage (VT) transistors which are indistinguishable in the layout. This allows for a single circuit that utilizes these transistors to be used for Boolean functions and thus makes the design not susceptible to reverse engineering. Side channel attacks derive the function of the IC while the device is in operation. This class of attacks measures and compares the variation in the performance parameters such as time delay and current consumption. The proposed pass gate-based threshold voltage defined (PG-TVD) logic family when compared to the enhanced threshold voltage defined logic families (E-TVD) reduces the average variation by almost an order of magnitude; from 7.06% down to 0.75%. The PG-TVD logic family when compared to the Threshold Voltage Defined (TVD) Logic Family reduces the area by 25%, current consumption by 24%, and time delay by 20%. </p>

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“…In [4] time delay was randomized to obfuscate the gate-level functions being performed. In [5] and [6] the authors introduced threshold voltage defined (TVD) logic families which used transistors with different threshold voltage levels to create logic gates that camouflaged the functionality of the IC/IP.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pass Gate Based Threshold Voltage Defined Logic Family with Resilience Against Hardware Attacks

Thomas¹,

Park²,

Maghari³

2023

Preprint

0

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

<p>Electronic counterfeiting is a major source of concern from a security and reliability standpoint. For digital integrated circuits (ICs), reverse engineering can reveal the design and functionality of the circuit. A solution to this problem is to leverage different threshold voltage (VT) transistors which are indistinguishable in the layout. This allows for a single circuit that utilizes these transistors to be used for Boolean functions and thus makes the design not susceptible to reverse engineering. Side channel attacks derive the function of the IC while the device is in operation. This class of attacks measures and compares the variation in the performance parameters such as time delay and current consumption. The proposed pass gate-based threshold voltage defined (PG-TVD) logic family when compared to the enhanced threshold voltage defined logic families (E-TVD) reduces the average variation by almost an order of magnitude; from 7.06% down to 0.75%. The PG-TVD logic family when compared to the Threshold Voltage Defined (TVD) Logic Family reduces the area by 25%, current consumption by 24%, and time delay by 20%. </p>

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Standard cell camouflage method to counter silicon reverse engineering

Cited by 6 publications

References 5 publications

Hardware Trust and Assurance through Reverse Engineering: A Survey and Outlook from Image Analysis and Machine Learning Perspectives

Hardware Trust and Assurance through Reverse Engineering: A Survey and Outlook from Image Analysis and Machine Learning Perspectives

Pass Gate Based Threshold Voltage Defined Logic Family with Resilience Against Hardware Attacks

Pass Gate Based Threshold Voltage Defined Logic Family with Resilience Against Hardware Attacks

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