EAGER: SARE: Physically disordered nanostructures for lightweight and secure authentication on CMOS platform

身份认证是在泛在系统中建立安全的基本原语之一。当前身份验证的最佳实践依赖于加密和安全密钥。这种方法很难扩展到新兴应用，因为它的高功耗以及对物理和密码攻击的脆弱性。强大的物理不可克隆功能(SPUF)承诺了一种基于身体障碍的轻量级和安全的身份验证方法。到目前为止，具有所需安全特性的SPUF仅通过光学或生物学进行了演示。但在移动和无处不在的系统中将它们与电子产品集成是不切实际的。该项目探索在硅芯片上实现安全和实用的SPUF的技术，以满足新兴无处不在的电子产品对安全解决方案的需求。该项目还包括对研究生和本科生进行硬件安全方面的培训和教学。该项目旨在模拟已证实的光学无序SPUF系统，并使用建立在CMOS平台上的电子渗流系统进行身份验证。这一跨学科项目将以三个目标进行：与CMOS兼容的电渗流纳米结构；CMOS读出电路和替代集成策略；系统设计和原理验证SPUF的评估。该项目包括分析和优化跨层设计空间，涉及纳米结构的不相关程度、电路的测量分辨率和编码方案的复杂性。总体而言，该项目可能会创建一个完全不同的完整解决方案，以应对无处不在的硬件设备的认证挑战。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Authentication is one of the fundamental primitives to establish security in ubiquitous systems. The current best practice for authentication relies upon cryptography and secure keys. Such an approach can hardly be scaled to emerging applications due to its high-power consumption and vulnerabilities to physical and cryptographic attacks. Strong Physically Unclonable Function (SPUF) promises a lightweight and secure authentication method based on physical disorders. So far, SPUFs with the desired security properties has only been demonstrated with optics or biology. But it is not practical to integrate them with electronics in mobile and ubiquitous systems. This project explores technologies to enable secure and practical SPUFs on silicon chips, which addresses the needs for security solutions in emerging ubiquitous electronics. The project also includes training and teaching graduate and undergraduate students on hardware security.This project aims to emulate the proven optically disordered SPUF system with an electrical percolation system built on CMOS platforms for authentication. The inter-disciplinary project will be carried out with three objectives: CMOS-compatible electrical percolation nanostructures; CMOS readout circuits and alternative integration strategies; system design and assessment of proof-of-principle SPUFs. The project includes analysis and optimization of the cross-layer design space involving the degree of uncorrelation for nanostructures, the measurement resolution of circuits, and the complexity of encoding schemes. Overall, the project can potentially create a radically different and complete solution to the challenge of authenticating ubiquitous hardware devices.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.