Early Validation of SoCs Security Architecture Against Timing Flows Using SystemC-based VPs

Abstract

Modern System-on-Chips (SoCs) have been increasingly deployed in critical aspects of our lives. As a consequence, they have access to a large number of secret assets that must be protected against unauthorized access. In order to provide sound security guarantees, an SoC typically has a security architecture as authentication mechanisms to control the access of different Intellectual Properties (IPs) to secret assets. Since the SoC's security architecture cannot be changed after production, it is of utmost importance to detect any security flaws in the design phase. Moreover, to prevent costly fixes in later stages, security validation should start as early as possible. In this paper, we propose a novel approach to validate the security architecture of a given SoC against timing flows using SystemC-based Virtual Prototype (VP) and static information flow tracking technique at the system level. Experimental results on two real-world VP-based SoCs demonstrate the scalability and applicability of the proposed approach in identifying timing flows.