Toward reliable SRAM-based device identification

Abstract

Due to process variation, power-up values of embedded SRAM memory are unique for individual devices. They are used as SRAM fingerprints to identify integrated-circuits which is fundamental for security applications. The fingerprints, however, are sensitive to environmental changes. Consequently, during the identification process, errors may occur. To overcome this inherent nondeterminism, we provide a systematic approach to designing reliable SRAM-based identification system. We also discuss how to evaluate its system performance. We present a generic score-fusion-based matching recipe to identify devices with high confidence across a wide range of environmental conditions.