Maxim Integrated Products, Inc.

Yann Yves Rene Loisel

Frank Lhermet

Jeremy Dubeuf

Vincent Debout

Christophe Tremlet

Alain-Christophe Rollet

Stephane Di Vito

Grégory Rome

Yann Guade

Bhartendu Mishra

Vincent Albanese

Described herein are systems and methods that prevent against fault injection attacks. In various embodiments this is accomplished by taking advantage of the fact that an attacker cannot utilize a result that has been faulted to recover a secret. By using infective computation, an error is propagated in a loop such that the faulted value will provide to the attacker no useful information or information from which useful information may be extracted. Faults from a fault attack will be so large that a relatively large number of bits will change. As a result, practically no secret information can be extracted by restoring bits.

Fault attack resistant cryptographic systems and methods

Various embodiments of the invention implement countermeasures designed to withstand attacks by potential intruders who seek partial or full retrieval of elliptic curve secrets by using Various embodiments of the invention implement countermeasures designed to withstand attacks by potential intruders who seek partial or full retrieval of elliptic curve secrets by using known methods that exploit system vulnerabilities, including elliptic operation differentiation, dummy operation detection, lattice attacks, and first real operation detection. Various embodiments of the invention provide resistance against side-channel attacks, such as simple power analysis, caused by the detectability of scalar values from information leaked during regular operation flow that would otherwise compromise system security. In certain embodiments, system immunity is maintained by performing elliptic scalar operations that use secret-independent operation flow in a secure Elliptic Curve Cryptosystem.

Systems and methods for operating secure elliptic curve cryptosystems

Presented are systems and methods for protecting secret data that is stored in memory to prevent unauthorized access and data manipulation. Various embodiments may be applied to hide or mask an RSA exponent used for public key cryptography and stored in a cryptographic hardware block that uses a non-erasable working memory for computations. In certain embodiments, masking RSA exponents is accomplished by a two-step process that combines a specifically calculated, random and secret value with the secret exponent. The random value is stored in an erasable memory, such that in case of attack, both the erasable memory and the non-erasable memory do not leak any embedded secrets. The additional expenditure of memory resources only insignificantly affects system performance.

Systems and methods for masking RSA operations

Presented are software intellectual property (IP) protection systems and methods that prevent potential attackers as well as customers from having access to plain text versions of both library source code and binary code. Potential attackers are prevented from reusing the software on other platforms. The protection mechanism does not impact the functionality or the performance of the library itself and does not interfere with existing software update mechanisms or application developer tools, such as Joint Test Action Group (JTAG).

Software intellectual property protection systems and methods for embedded platforms

Various embodiments of the invention implement countermeasures designed to withstand attacks by potential intruders who seek partial or full retrieval of elliptic curve secrets by using known methods that exploit system vulnerabilities, including elliptic operation differentiation, dummy operation detection, lattice attacks, and first real operation detection. Various embodiments of the invention provide resistance against side-channel attacks, such as sample power analysis, caused by the detectability of scalar values from information leaked during regular operation flow that would otherwise compromise system security. In certain embodiments, system immunity is maintained by performing elliptic scalar operations that use secret-independent operation flow in a secure Elliptic Curve Cryptosystem.

Embodiments of the invention prevent unauthorized access to electronic systems by providing an enclosure with improved intrusion detection around sensitive areas of a secured electronic system. Certain embodiments eliminate the need for constant battery power and yet provide uninterrupted high-security supervision at the device perimeter such that even following a power down event it is possible to determine whether a device has been tampered with, so that appropriate action can be taken. This is especially useful in applications in which batteries are not acceptable.

Tamper detection systems and methods for industrial and metering devices not requiring a battery

The present invention relates to key management in a secure microcontroller, and more particularly, to systems, devices and methods of automatically and transparently employing logic or physical address based keys that may also be transferred using dedicated buses. A cryptographic engine translates a logic address to at least one physical address, and processes a corresponding data word based on at least one target key. The target key is selected from a plurality of keys based on the logic or physical address. A universal memory controller stores each processed data word in the corresponding physical address within a memory. Each key is associated with a memory region within the memory, and therefore, the logic or physical address associated with a memory region may be used to automatically identify the corresponding target key. A dedicated secure link may be used to transport key request commands and the plurality of keys.

Systems and methods for managing cryptographic keys in a secure microcontroller

Various embodiments allow for flexible and secure updates of drivers for numerous types of external memory devices by utilizing an address-selection mechanism within a simple and secure ROM code to enable the loading of a dynamic routine from an external source into a dynamic memory. In certain embodiments, the routine enables a simple and trusted framework to access and modify the content of any number of complex memory devices via simple commands without affecting existing security measures. This increases the usable lifetime of secure ROM code, simplifies device validation, and shortens the overall development cycle by extending the functionality of secure ROM code while keeping the ROM code and any programming thereof simple.

Systems and methods to extend ROM functionality

Various embodiments of the invention provide a strong logical link between a SAM and a secure terminal to combat SAM counterfeiting and misuse. The link is based on mutual validation methods using firmware and cryptographic protocols. Once the SAM is removed from a terminal that it has been tied to, or the link is broken by a tampering attempt of a potential intruder, the SAM and/or the terminal are disabled.

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La Ciotat, France

Yann Yves Rene Loisel