Protection of secure electronic modules against attacks

US7953987B2 · kind B2 · utility

Assignee

• International Business Machines Corporation · US

Inventors

• Carl U. Buscaglia · Clinton Corners, US
• Vincenzo Condorelli · Poughkeepsie, US
• Kevin C. Gotze · Poughkeepsie, US
• Nihad Hadzic · Beacon, US
• Donald W. Plass · Poughkeepsie, US
• Tamas Visegrady · Zürich, CH

Key dates

• Filing date: Mar 6, 2007
• Grant date: May 31, 2011
• Expiry date: Sep 8, 2029

Classification

• Technology area (CPC G): Physics
• CPC primary: G06F2221/2143
• WIPO field: Computer technology
• WIPO sector: Electrical engineering

Abstract

A method and apparatus is disclosed for preventing the unintended retention of secret data caused by preferred state/burn-in in secure electronic modules. Sequentially storing the data and its inverse on alternating clock cycles, and by actively overwriting it to destroy it, prevents SRAM devices from developing a preferred state. By encrypting a relatively large amount of secret data with a master encryption key, and storing said master key in this non-preferred state storage, the electronic module conveniently extends this protection scheme to a large amount of data, without the overhead of investing or actively erasing the larger storage area.