Asynchronous computing countermeasure against power analysis attack on modern cryptosystems

• Main Author: Pang, Alisa Hwee Mian
• Other Authors: Gwee Bah Hwee
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: DRNTU::Engineering::Electrical and electronic engineering::Computer hardware, software and systems
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/63590
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

In the modern world today, cryptography has become ubiquitous. It can be found easily on many applications and devices that everyone owns, for example our account passwords, smart cards, and also within our mobile phones. In this report, the effectiveness of the cryptosystem, specifically the Advanced Encryption Standard (AES), is investigated and implemented onto the 8051 microcontroller evaluation board to assess its effectiveness in countermeasuring side channel attacks targetted onto our storage devices. During encryption of the AES algorithm onto the microcontroller board, the power consumption traces can be recorded. From this traces obtained, the difference in fluctuations can be used to identify the different encryption rounds involved. These traces are then analysed and comupted to obtain the correct keys used for encryption. The procedures involves coding the AES algorithm onto the C8051 microcontroller evaluation board using Silicon Laboratories IDE, followed by achieving the correct key input by generating the highest correlation coefficient values using MATLAB. The codes used has been proven to be effective in determining the correct key values that have been used in the encryption process. Other improvement methods that can be looked into after the completion of this project, such as introducing masking and hiding techniques to flatten out the power consumption traces has been mentioned as future works following this project.