Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Replacing eFlash with STTRAM in IoTs: Security Challenges and Solutions

  • Published:
Journal of Hardware and Systems Security Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Spin-transfer torque RAM (STTRAM) is an emerging non-volatile memory (NVM) technology that provides better endurance, write energy and performance than traditional NVM technologies such as Flash. In embedded application such as microcontroller SoC of Internet of Things (IoTs), embedded Flash (eFlash) is widely employed. However, eFlash is also associated with cost, poor reliability and high write energy consumption. Therefore, replacing eFlash with emerging NVMs is desirable in IoTs and have been investigated in literature. Although promising, STTRAM brings several new security and privacy challenges such as magnetic attacks that pose a significant threat to sensitive program stored in memory. In this paper, we investigate these challenges and propose a novel memory architecture for attack resilient IoT network. The information redundancy present in a homogeneous peer-to-peer connected IoT network is exploited to restore the corrupted memory of any IoT node after magnetic attack. Since restoring program memory from other IoT is associated with energy overhead, we propose to reduce the number of corrupted bits by using high retention STTRAM at the cost of one-time write energy overhead. Energy overhead for the recovery process is estimated using commercial IoT boards, showing 19.85 nJ/bit for 100 MB data transfer. Increasing the STTRAM resiliency with a thermal stability factor of 72 reduces the recovery energy overhead to 9.01 nJ/bit (54.61% improvement) for a 100 Oe magnetic attack persisting for 1 s. We further propose to reduce the transfer energy by applying error correction codes (ECC) in STTRAM, which shows 10× (105×) improvement in energy for 64 (128) bit words with 16-bit ECC.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6
Fig. 7
Fig. 8
Fig. 9
Fig. 10
Fig. 11
Fig. 12

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Evans D (2011) The Internet of Things, Cisco IBSG, [Online] Available: https://www.cisco.com/c/dam/en_us/about/ac79/docs/innov/IoT_IBSG_0411FINAL.pdf

  2. Arduino Yun, IoT prototyping board, https://www.arduino.cc/en/Main/ArduinoBoardYun/

  3. Qualcomm Dragonboard 410c, IoT prototyping board, https://developer.qualcomm.com/hardware/dragonboard-410c/

  4. Raspberry Pi 3, IoT prototyping board, https://www.raspberrypi.org/magpi/raspberry-pi-3-specs-benchmarks/

  5. Jayakumar H et al (2014) Powering the internet of things. In Proc. ISLPED, La Jolla, pp. 375–380

  6. Chien S-Y et al (2015) Distributed computing in IoT: system-on-a-chip for smart cameras as an example. In Proc. ASP-DAC, Chiba, pp. 130–135

  7. Roman R, Najera P, Lopez J (2011) Securing the Internet of Things. J Comput 44(9):51–58. https://doi.org/10.1109/MC.2011.291

    Google Scholar 

  8. Everspin STT-MRAM, https://www.everspin.com/ddr3-dram-compatible-mram-spin-torque-technology-0/

  9. Avalanche Technology STT-MRAM, http://www.avalanche-technology.com/technology/

  10. Jayakumar H et al (2016) Energy-efficient system design for IoT devices. In Proc. ASP-DAC, Macao SAR, China, pp. 298–301

  11. Jayakumar H et al (2015) QuickRecall: a HW/SW approach for computing across power cycles in transiently powered computers. J Emerg Technol Comput Syst 12(1), pp 8:1–8:19

  12. Jayakumar H et al (2014) QUICKRECALL: a low overhead HW/SW approach for enabling computations across power cycles in transiently powered computers, In Proc. VLSID, Mumbai, India, pp. 330–335

  13. Balsamo D, Weddell AS, Merrett GV, al-Hashimi BM, Brunelli D, Benini L (2015) Hibernus: sustaining computation during intermittent supply for energy-harvesting systems. IEEE Emb Sys Lett 7(1):15–18. https://doi.org/10.1109/LES.2014.2371494

    Article  Google Scholar 

  14. Rodriguez A et al (2015) Approaches to transient computing for energy harvesting systems: a quantitative evaluation, in Proc. ENSsys, Seoul, pp. 3–8

  15. Kumar S, Charentenay Y (2017) Emerging non-volatile memory 2017, Yole Développement, [Online] Available: https://www.i-micronews.com/images/Flyers/Manufacturing/Yole_YDMS17023_Emerging_non-volatile_Memory_2017_Flyer.pdf

  16. Jang J, Ghosh S (2016) Performance impact of magnetic and thermal attack on STTRAM and low-overhead mitigation techniques. In Proc. ISLPED, San Francisco, pp. 136–141

  17. Jang J et al (2015) Self-correcting STTRAM under magnetic field attacks, in Proc. DAC, San Francisco, pp 77:1–77:6

  18. Rathi N et al (2016) Data privacy in non-volatile cache: challenges, attack models and solutions, In Proc. ASP-DAC, Macao SAR, China, pp. 348–353

  19. Iyengar AS et al (2015) Domain wall magnets for embedded memory and hardware security. IEEE J Emerg Sel Topics Circ Syst 5(1):40–50

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Ghosh S (2016) Spintronics and security: prospects, vulnerabilities, attack models, and preventions. Proc IEEE 104(10):1864–1893. https://doi.org/10.1109/JPROC.2016.2583419

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Kryder MH, Kim CS (2019) After hard drives—what comes next? IEEE Trans Magn 45(10):3406–3413

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. Heidecker J (2012) MRAM technology and status, NEPP Electronic Technology Workshop, NASA GSFC, [Online] Available: https://nepp.nasa.gov/workshops/etw2012/talks/Tuesday/T05_Heidecker_MRAM_Technology.pdf

  23. Merritt R (2017) IoT May Need Sub-50-Cent SoCs, [Online] Available: https://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1332506/

  24. MacGillivray G (2005) Process vs. density in DRAMs, [Online] Available: http://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1281083/

  25. Zhang J, Levy P, Zhang S, Antropov V (2004) Identification of transverse spin currents in noncollinear magnetic structures. Phys Rev Lett 93(25). doi: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.93.256602

  26. Rippard W, Heindl R, Pufall M, Russek S, Kos A (2011) Thermal relaxation rates of magnetic nanoparticles in the presence of magnetic fields and spin-transfer effects. Phys Rev B 84(6). doi: https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.84.064439

  27. Khan MNI et al (2017) Novel magnetic burn-in for retention testing of STTRAM, In Proc. DATE, Lausanne, Switzerland, pp. 666–669

  28. Chen P et al (2005) A time-to-digital-converter-based CMOS smart temperature sensor. IEEE J Solid-State Circ 40(8):1642–1648. https://doi.org/10.1109/JSSC.2005.852041

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Iyengar AS et al (2016) Spintronic PUFs for security, trust, and authentication. ACM J Emerg Technol Comput Syst 13(1), pp 4:1–4:15

  30. Pappu R, Recht B, Taylor J, Gershenfeld N (2002) Physical one-way functions. Science 297(5589):2026–2030. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1074376

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Funding

This work was supported by Semiconductor Research Corporation (Task# 2727.001) and National Science Foundation (CNS - 1722557) and DARPA Young Faculty Award (#D15AP00089).

Author information

Author notes

  1. Asmit De and Mohammad Nasim Imtiaz Khan contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA, 16802, USA

    Asmit De, Mohammad Nasim Imtiaz Khan & Swaroop Ghosh

  2. School of Electrical Engineering, Korea University, Seoul, 136-701, South Korea

    Jongsun Park

Authors
  1. Asmit De
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Mohammad Nasim Imtiaz Khan
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Jongsun Park
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Swaroop Ghosh
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Asmit De.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

De, A., Khan, M.N.I., Park, J. et al. Replacing eFlash with STTRAM in IoTs: Security Challenges and Solutions. J Hardw Syst Secur 1, 328–339 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41635-017-0026-x

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41635-017-0026-x

Keywords

Search

Navigation