Developing secure, ultra-low power RISC processor

• Main Author: Ang, Kai Jun
• Other Authors: Anupam Chattopadhyay
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: Nanyang Technological University 2023
• Subjects: Engineering::Computer science and engineering
• Online Access: https://hdl.handle.net/10356/165949
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

Technology is becoming much more prevalent in the lives of many, mostly in the form of Internet of Things devices. A common feature in IoT devices is the ability to perform firmware over-the-air updates so as to able to introduce new functionality to existing devices. These firmware over-the-air updates are currently using only classical cryptography algorithms for security. While this may be sufficient for now, it may not be in the future. Quantum Computing is a growing field and post-quantum algorithms capable of breaking certain classical cryptography algorithms have been developed. While there is yet to be a sufficiently powerful quantum computer to run these algorithms, it is vital that existing protocols using only classical cryptography be updated to include quantum resistant cryptography. This project aims to develop a hybrid implementation of the firmware over-the-air update process, incorporating both classical and post-quantum cryptography. The project was successful in developing a hybrid implementation that is able to verify digital signatures from both a classical and a post quantum cryptography algorithm. This project, however, was unable to complete the entirety of the firmware over-the-air update process, falling short of implementing the bootloader code.