Nonlinear Code-based Low-Overhead Fine-Grained Control Flow Checking

G. Dar (1) , Giorgio Di Natale (2) , O. Keren (1)

1 Bar-Ilan University [Israël]
2 TIMA-AMfoRS - Architectures and Methods for Resilient Systems

A hardware-based control flow monitoring technique enables the detection of errors in both the control flow and the instruction stream executed on a processor. However, as shown in recent publications, these techniques fail to detect malicious carefully-tuned manipulations of the instruction stream in a basic block. This paper presents a non-linear encoder and checker that can cope with this weakness. It is a MAC based control flow checker that has the advantage of working with basic blocks of variable length, can detect every error, and performs the computation in real-time. The architecture can easily be modified to support different signature size and error masking probabilities.

Mots clés: Embedded Security; Control Flow Checking; Non-Linear Codes; Signature; Countermeasures

Domaines: Micro et nanotechnologies/Microélectronique

G. Dar, Giorgio Di Natale, O. Keren. Nonlinear Code-based Low-Overhead Fine-Grained Control Flow Checking. IEEE Transactions on Computers, 2021, ⟨10.1109/TC.2021.3057132⟩. ⟨hal-03152639⟩