A Lightweight Reconfigurable RRAM-based PUF for Highly Secure Applications

Abstract

Recently, memristors received considerable attention in various applications. Even some of the main drawbacks of resistive memory devices (RRAM), such as variability, have become attractive features for hardware security in the form of a Physically Unclonable Function (PUF). Although several RRAM-based PUFs have appeared in the literature, they still suffer from some issues related to reliability, reconfigurability, and extensive integration cost. This paper presents a novel lightweight reconfigurable RRAM-based PUF (LRR-PUF) wherein multiple RRAM cells, connected to the same bit line and same transistor (1T4R), are used to generate a single bit response. The pulse programming method used is also innovative: 1) it allows for a power-efficient implementation, and 2) it exploits variations in the number of pulses needed to switch the RRAM cell as the primary entropy source of the PUF. The main feature of the proposed PUF is its integration with any RRAM architecture at almost no additional cost. Through extensive simulations, including the impact of temperature and voltage variations along with statistical characterization, we demonstrate that the LRR-PUF exhibits such attractive properties that are lacking or poorly achieved in other previously proposed RRAM based PUFs, including high reliability (almost 100%), which is critical for cryptographic key generation, reconfigurability, uniqueness, cost, and efficiency. Furthermore, the design successfully passes relevant NIST tests for randomness.

Reconfigurable Physically Unclonable Functions Based on Nanoscale Voltage‐Controlled Magnetic Tunnel Junctions

“…It is worth comparing the demonstrated PUF with other reconfigurable PUF designs based on emerging memories. Due to the dynamic source of entropy that could be utilized for reconfigurability, non-volatile memories such as phase change memory (PCM) [80] and resistive random-access memory (RRAM) [81][82][83][84][85] have also gained attention for reconfigurable PUF applications. However, both PCM and RRAM based PUF designs require the devices to be initialized to the same (high/low) resistance states before the reconfiguration, while the proposed VCMA-MRAM based PUF can be reconfigured regardless of the initial state.…”

“…For example, the PCM based PUF needs to either compare the current flowing through the device to multiple reference values, or to count the number of programming pulses required to make the cell resistance converge to the target value, [80] and the RRAM based PUF requires either comparison between the resistance of two RRAM cells, [81,82,85] or to count the time needed to set the RRAM cell. [84]…”

A Novel RFID Authentication Protocol Based on Reconfigurable RRAM PUF

“…Recently, emerging non-volatile memory (NVM) based PUFs have been proposed [4], including phase change memory (PCM) PUFs [5], spin torque transfer magnetic random access memory (STT-MRAM) PUFs [6] and resistive random access memory(RRAM, or memristor) PUFs [7][8][9][10][11][12][13], such as Cross Bar PUF, RRAM PUF, and EPUF. However, most still suffer from some issues, mainly reliability, reconfigurability, and extensive integration cost.…”

“…It should be noted that the NVM PUF may not follow the canonical definition of PUF, but it is more similar to a true random number generator with a (secure) NVM. Most of these prior works are based on simulations [13] or a single device measurement, which usually could not accurately reflect the statistics of variability and reliability in the memory arrays. To date, there are limited experimental data available in the literature about NVM based PUFs' characteristics at the array-level.…”