Cornami is an interesting company. Their leader is also an interesting person. I’ve interviewed Wally Rhines many times on various topics. All of them have been big hits. Cornami is focused on enabling fully homomorphic encryption (FHE) in a commercially viable and widespread manner. Many say this isn’t possible, but Wally and… Read More
Enlisting Entropy to Generate Secure SoC Root Keys
Most methods of securing SOCs involve storing a root key that provides the basis of all derived keys and encryption of communication. The weakness with these methods is that even if the root key is stored in secure non-volatile memory, there are often methods to read the key. Once a key has been divulged the device can be cloned and … Read More
Using PUFs for Random Number Generation
In our daily lives, few of us if any, would want randomness to play any role. We look for predictability in order to plan our lives. But reality is that random numbers have been playing a role in our lives for a long time. The more conspicuous use cases of random numbers are with key fobs, and nowadays mobile phones. And then there are a … Read More
Side Channel Analysis at RTL. Innovation in Verification
Roots of trust can’t prevent attacks through side-channels which monitor total power consumption or execution timing. Correcting weakness to such attacks requires pre-silicon vulnerability analysis. Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former Synopsys CTO)… Read More
Ultra-Wide Band Finds New Relevance
Do you use Tile or other Bluetooth tracking devices? If so, you know that such devices, attached to your car keys or wallet, created a small stir. A way to track down something you can’t find. Very neat but hardly revolutionary. One of those consumer tchotchkes as likely to be handed out as trade-show swag as purchased.
So why did Apple… Read More
Quantum Computing and Threats to Secure Communication
There is never a dearth of new terms, discoveries and inventions in the technological world. And sometimes existing terms get reinvigorated. And debates ensue. The debaters argue about the plusses and minuses and make some predictions. Such is the case with “Quantum Computing.” I recently watched and listened to a webinar that… Read More
Security Hot Again in the Venture World
From a lowly perspective in the hardware world, VCs can seem like magpies. Overly fascinated with bright, shiny ideas of questionable value. Stratospheric valuations and a quick exit that have the rest of us scratching our heads. What difference is this going to make beyond minting a few new billionaires? Why not, say, have security… Read More
A Hardware Security Standard Advances
Security is a slippery topic. We all agree that “something should be done”, but most of us are waiting for someone else to lead the way. There’s no shortage of proprietary solutions, though given the distributed nature of the problem it’s difficult to see how those separately or collectively can rise to the occasion. What we really… Read More
IoT’s Inconvenient Truth: IoT Security Is a Never-Ending Battle
The continued innovation and widespread adoption of connected devices — the internet of things (IoT) — has resulted in a vast range of conveniences that improve our lives every day. At the same time, the ubiquity of IoT devices, which market watchers estimate to be in the tens of billions, also makes it more attractive to bad actors… Read More
Fuzzing to Validate SoC Security. Innovation in Verification
Fuzzing is to software verification what randomization is hardware verification. Can a fuzzing approach improve hardware security testing? Paul Cunningham (GM, Verification at Cadence), Raúl Camposano (Silicon Catalyst, entrepreneur, former Synopsys CTO) and I continue our series on research ideas. As always, feedback… Read More
Intel’s IDM 2.0