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Tamper Sensitive Ternary ReRAM-Based PUFs

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Intelligent Computing

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems ((LNNS,volume 285))

Abstract

The physical properties of resistive random-access memories can be exploited to design physical unclonable functions, they can also be used to insert sensing elements detecting tampering activities. We are presenting how un-filtered cryptographic key generation cycles can permanently damage about 20% to 40% of the memory cell population, while the strong cells return to their pristine state after operation. During an enrollment cycle performed once upfront, the weak cells are identified, tracked with a ternary state, and never used during subsequent key generation cycles thereafter. The weak cells are likely to be damaged when the opponent blindly characterizes the physical unclonable functions or attempt to generate cryptographic keys. Thereby these weaker cells act as sensing elements of this type of attacks. The cryptographic scheme is optimized to tolerate a certain level of failure of the stronger cells, and to compute ternary states to keep track of the weaker cells. The implementation was written in Phyton and C++ at the server level, and in C at the client level. The protocols use the standard hash algorithm SHA-3, and the extended output function SHAKE.

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Acknowledgments

The authors are thanking Dr. Donald Telesca from the Information Directorate of the US Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) for his scientific contribution, and support of this research work. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of AFRL. The authors are also thanking the contribution the research team at Northern Arizona University, in particular Julie Heynssens, and Ian Burke, and the PhD graduate students Morgan Riggs, and Taylor Wilson. We are also thanking our industrial partners who provided outstanding ReRAM samples, with the support of Dr. John Callahan and Ankineedu Velaga from BRIDG, and Ashish Pancholi, Dr. Hagop Nazarian, Dr. Jo Sung-Hyun, and Jeremy Guy From Crossbar Inc.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ, 86011, USA

    Bertrand Cambou & Ying-Chen Chen

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  1. Bertrand Cambou
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  2. Ying-Chen Chen
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Correspondence to Bertrand Cambou .

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  1. Faculty of Science and Engineering, Saga University, Saga, Japan

    Kohei Arai

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Cambou, B., Chen, YC. (2021). Tamper Sensitive Ternary ReRAM-Based PUFs. In: Arai, K. (eds) Intelligent Computing. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 285. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-80129-8_67

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