NXP enhances protection circuits SmartMX2 using cloning technology counter PUF

Current global trends, such as urbanization, the translation of government documents in digital format, better protection of bank cards and the growing popularity of technology NFC, encourage active than ever before, the use of chip security to protect user data, access rights, and financial information. Parallel to this, there are more and more sophisticated methods of attack to disrupt the functionality of chips security and data theft.

NXP Semiconductors company expects the first to bring to market smart cards and embedded security elements with integrated chip technology PUF (Physically Unclonable Function - «physically nekloniruemaya function") of Intrinsic-ID. PUF - an innovative way to prevent theft of data from individual chips. It uses the unique characteristics of the semiconductor device to protect the encryption key, which makes it difficult cloning, reverse engineering and compromise of security microcontrollers.

PUF technology is based on the physical characteristics of the SRAM. After the power used by a safety cell initialized randomly. This behavior at power - switching bits between zero and one - individually for each chip.Therefore, the contents after power is unique characteristic feature that can be used to protect the encryption key or memory protection.

Technology Intrinsic-ID PUF is currently being integrated into the new generation of chips SmartMX2 .Microcontroller SmartMX2 received the world's first certified Common Criteria EAL 6 + Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) in Germany. Incidentally, since the start of the supply shipped almost two billion chips SmartMX, including electronic passports. As stated, the use of PUF technology significantly increases protection against attacks such as chips "reverse engineering" by not permanently store digital encryption.

According to NXP, the integration of technology in the PUF SmartMX2 microcontroller chip architecture significantly improves safety and enhances the protection of applications such as mobile payments technology-based NFC, e-ticketing, and eGovernment services and information security.

Source: NXP