Proof-Carrying Hardware: Concept and Prototype Tool Flow for Online Verification

Abstract

Dynamically reconfigurable hardware combines hardware performance with software-like flexibility and finds increasing use in networked systems. The capability to load hardware modules at runtime provides these systems with an unparalleled degree of adaptivity but at the same time poses new challenges for security and safety. In this paper, we elaborate on the presentation of proof carrying hardware (PCH) as a novel approach to reconfigurable system security. PCH takes a key concept from software security, known as proof-carrying code, into the reconfigurable hardware domain. We outline the PCH concept and discuss runtime combinational equivalence checking as a first online verification problem applying the concept. We present a prototype tool flow and experimental results demonstrating the feasibility and potential of the PCH approach.

Introduction to Hardware Security

“…Rather, the safety policy agreed by both bitstream providers and IP users is to make sure that both sides follow the same bitstream formats, the conjunctive normal form to represent combinational functions, and the propositional calculus for proof construction and verification. A more detailed introduction to the SAT solver based proof-carrying framework on configurable platforms was then introduced in [66]. The hardware trust and threat model as well as experimental setup are elaborated on in [23].…”

Pre-silicon security verification and validation

“…Following the concept of PCC, authors in [9][10][11][12] proposed the Proof-Carrying Hardware (PCH) framework for dynamically reconfigurable hardware platforms. In the PCH framework, authors used runtime combinational equivalence checking (CEC) for verifying equivalence between the design specification and the design implementation.…”