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SoK: Assisted Fault Simulation

Existing Challenges and Opportunities Offered by AI

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Applied Cryptography and Network Security Workshops (ACNS 2023)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 13907))

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Abstract

Fault injection attacks have caused implementations to behave unexpectedly, resulting in a spectacular bypass of security features and even the extraction of cryptographic keys. Clearly, developers want to ensure the robustness of the software against faults and eliminate production weaknesses that could lead to exploitation. Several fault simulators have been released that promise cost-effective evaluations against fault attacks. In this paper, we set out to discover how suitable such tools are, for a developer who wishes to create robust software against fault attacks. We found four open-source fault simulators that employ different techniques to navigate faults, which we objectively compare and discuss their benefits and drawbacks. Unfortunately, none of the four open-source fault simulators employ artificial intelligence (AI) techniques. However, AI was successfully applied to improve the fault simulation of cryptographic algorithms, though none of these tools is open source. We suggest improvements to open-source fault simulators inspired by the AI techniques used by cryptographic fault simulators.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The terms, simulation, and emulation, have been used interchangeably.

  2. 2.

    https://github.com/vporpo/zofi.

  3. 3.

    https://github.com/emsec/arm-fault-simulator.

  4. 4.

    https://github.com/Fraunhofer-AISEC/archie.

  5. 5.

    https://github.com/Riscure/FiSim/releases.

  6. 6.

    By masked instructions, the authors mean instructions that are not vulnerable to fault effects.

  7. 7.

    24:46:39.962 h implies 24 h, 46 min and 39.962 s.

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Acknowledgment

This work received funding in the framework of the NWA Cybersecurity Call with project name PROACT with project number NWA.1215.18.014, which is (partly) financed by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Radboud University, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Asmita Adhikary & Ileana Buhan

Authors
  1. Asmita Adhikary
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  2. Ileana Buhan
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Correspondence to Asmita Adhikary or Ileana Buhan .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Singapore University of Technology and Design, Singapore, Singapore

    Jianying Zhou

  2. Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Lejla Batina

  3. Shandong University of Science and Technology, Qingdao, China

    Zengpeng Li

  4. University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China

    **gqiang Lin

  5. University of Padua, Padua, Italy

    Eleonora Losiouk

  6. Concordia University, Montreal, QC, Canada

    Suryadipta Majumdar

  7. Illinois at Singapore Pte Ltd., Singapore, Singapore

    Daisuke Mashima

  8. Technical University Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark

    Weizhi Meng

  9. Radboud University Nijmegen, Nijmegen, The Netherlands

    Stjepan Picek

  10. Florida International University, Miami, FL, USA

    Mohammad Ashiqur Rahman

  11. Zhejiang Gongshang University, Hangzhou, China

    Jun Shao

  12. SECOM Co., Ltd., University of Tsukuba, Tokyo / Ibaraki, Japan

    Masaki Shimaoka

  13. Royal Holloway University of London, Egham, UK

    Ezekiel Soremekun

  14. University of Aizu, Aizuwakamatsu, Fukushima, Japan

    Chunhua Su

  15. Universiti Sains Malaysia, Gelugor, Malaysia

    Je Sen Teh

  16. University of Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette, Luxembourg

    Aleksei Udovenko

  17. City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Cong Wang

  18. Griffith University, Southport, QLD, Australia

    Leo Zhang

  19. Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands

    Yury Zhauniarovich

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Adhikary, A., Buhan, I. (2023). SoK: Assisted Fault Simulation. In: Zhou, J., et al. Applied Cryptography and Network Security Workshops. ACNS 2023. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 13907. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41181-6_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-41181-6_10

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