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Virginia Tech

Towards Comprehensive Side-channel Resistant Embedded Systems

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

Embedded devices almost involve every part of our lives, such as health condition monitoring, communicating with other people, traveling, financial transactions, etc. Within the embedded devices, our private information is utilized, collected and stored. Cryptography is the security mechanism within the embedded devices for protecting this secret information. However, cryptography algorithms can still be analyzed and attacked by malicious adversaries to steal secret data. There are different categories of attacks towards embedded devices, and the side-channel attack is one of the powerful attacks. Unlike analyzing the vulnerabilities within the cryptography algorithm itself in traditional attacks, the side-channel attack observes the physical effect signals while the cryptography algorithm runs on the device. These physical effects include the power consumption of the devices, timing, electromagnetic radiations, etc., and we call these physical effects that carry secret information side-channel leakage. By statistically analyzing these side-channel leakages, an attacker can reconstruct the secret information. The manifestation of side-channel leakage happens at the hardware level. Therefore, the designer has to ensure that the hardware design of the embedded system is secure against side-channel attacks. However, it is very arduous work. An embedded systems design including a large number of electronic components makes it very difficult to comprehensively capture every side-channel vulnerability, locate the root cause of the side-channel leakage, and efficiently fix the vulnerabilities. In this dissertation, we developed methodologies that can help designers detect and fix side-channel vulnerabilities within the embedded system design at low cost and early design stage.

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Doctor of Philosophy
Level thesis:degree_level
doctoral
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Computer Engineering
Department dc:contributor.department
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Grantor dc:publisher
Virginia Tech
Year dc:date.issued
2021

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Yao, Yuan
Chair dc:contributor.committeechair
  • Schaumont, Patrick R.
Committee members dc:contributor.committeemember
  • Reed, Jeffrey H.
  • Nazhandali, Leyla
  • Hicks, Matthew
  • Yao, Danfeng (Daphne)

Subjects

dc:subject × 7

Rights

dc:rights
Statement dc:rights
  • In Copyright

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Dc Identifier Other
vt_gsexam:32047
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/104662

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
Virginia Tech
Base URL
vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/oai/request
Last updated
2026-07-22
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Yao, Yuan. Towards Comprehensive Side-channel Resistant Embedded Systems. doctoral thesis, Virginia Tech, 2021. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/104662