Automated Computer Hardware Security System
Standing
Graduate (Masters)
Type of Proposal
Visual Presentation (Poster, Installation, Demonstration)
Faculty
Faculty of Engineering
Proposal
Abstract: Hackers are no able to bypass passwords and take raw electrical signals directly from a piece of computer hardware. Hardware security modules, which are pieces of computer hardware that are designed to play the role of keeping the computer secure, are now needed, and include a physical unclonable function, or a PUF. It requires a set of numbers, called a challenge, to trigger a pair of signals to reach another piece of computer hardware called an arbiter. If they reach the arbiter simultaneously, the hacker gains access to the entire computer hardware. Due to the fact that manufacturing processes cannot produce perfect replicas of computer hardware, the times at which the signals reach the arbiter are different in different copies of that hardware. This means that the challenge is different in different copies. Current components must be designed and manufactured from scratch, to make sure that the length dimensions of the hardware allow the number of times that a signal changes per second of time to be constant, and each unit of time in a time-to-digital converter to be the same as the length of any other unit of time. Field programmable gate arrays, or FPGA’s, come ready made. Some of the wire connections inside the hardware can be modified. The components common to all FPGA’s only allow a limited set of numbers to be generated. Delay buffers are added to the faster of the two signals to slow it down. Normally, however, the buffers must be added manually. In the research for this coming UWill Discover presentation, however, a new piece of hardware that adds delay buffers automatically shall be simulated on a software tool and the results of how that would affect the two PUF signals shall be generated on a computer-generated graph.
Grand Challenges
Understanding Borders
Automated Computer Hardware Security System
Abstract: Hackers are no able to bypass passwords and take raw electrical signals directly from a piece of computer hardware. Hardware security modules, which are pieces of computer hardware that are designed to play the role of keeping the computer secure, are now needed, and include a physical unclonable function, or a PUF. It requires a set of numbers, called a challenge, to trigger a pair of signals to reach another piece of computer hardware called an arbiter. If they reach the arbiter simultaneously, the hacker gains access to the entire computer hardware. Due to the fact that manufacturing processes cannot produce perfect replicas of computer hardware, the times at which the signals reach the arbiter are different in different copies of that hardware. This means that the challenge is different in different copies. Current components must be designed and manufactured from scratch, to make sure that the length dimensions of the hardware allow the number of times that a signal changes per second of time to be constant, and each unit of time in a time-to-digital converter to be the same as the length of any other unit of time. Field programmable gate arrays, or FPGA’s, come ready made. Some of the wire connections inside the hardware can be modified. The components common to all FPGA’s only allow a limited set of numbers to be generated. Delay buffers are added to the faster of the two signals to slow it down. Normally, however, the buffers must be added manually. In the research for this coming UWill Discover presentation, however, a new piece of hardware that adds delay buffers automatically shall be simulated on a software tool and the results of how that would affect the two PUF signals shall be generated on a computer-generated graph.