Masked SABL: A Long Lasting Side-Channel Protection Design Methodology

Abstract

As an outstanding cell-level countermeasure to defeat power analysis attacks, dual-rail pre-charge logics rely on balanced complementary paths. During the circuit lifetime, the gates undergo unavoidable changes due to the so-called device aging, hence imbalancing the dual rails. Here, we focus on Sense Amplifier Based Logic (SABL), and highlight the vulnerability of corresponding circuits when the device is aged. By integrating gate-level masking, we introduce a modified variant of SABL, maintaining its resistance in presence of device aging. The corresponding results, covering both dynamic and static power profiles, show the prominent impact of our construction on extending the protection of circuits for their entire lifetime.

Keywords

• Cryptographic circuits
• device aging
• Sense Amplifier Based Logic (SABL)
• side-channel analysis (SCA)