EURASIP Journal on Wireless Communications and Networking (Nov 2020)

A PUF-based cryptographic security solution for IoT systems on chip

  • Alexandra Balan,
  • Titus Balan,
  • Marcian Cirstea,
  • Florin Sandu

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1186/s13638-020-01839-6
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 2020, no. 1
pp. 1 – 22

Abstract

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Abstract The integration of multicore processors and peripherals from multiple intellectual property core providers as hardware components of IoT multiprocessor systems-on-chip (SoC) represents a source of security vulnerabilities for the in-chip communication. This paper describes the concept and the practical results of a SoC security implementation that is illustrative for IoT applications. The mechanism employed in this approach uses physically unclonable functions (PUF) and symmetric cryptography in order to encrypt the transferred messages within the SoC between the microprocessor and its peripherals. The mechanism is experimentally validated at FPGA level, the paper describing also an implementation scenario for an IoT ARM based device.

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