Tag Archive for: Hardware
Hardware Hacking | Hackaday
Sometimes, security mechanisms can be bypassed if you just do things slightly out of the ordinary. For instance, readout protection on microcontrollers is a given nowadays, to the point where it’s intentionally enabled and relied upon as a major technical measure to protect intellectual property. The gist is — when you connect to a microcontroller over its debug interface and then ask to read its flash memory, it will politely refuse. However, [Racerxdl] shows us that in practice, it’s not flawless protection – for certain chips, you just need to be a little quicker than usual.
Usually, flashing and debugging software will chat with the microcontroller for a bit, and probe parameters before going for any direct requests. However, if you skip the courtesy and bluntly get to the point immediately right after power is applied to the microcontroller, you can intimidate them just enough to give you one byte of its memory before it refuses to cooperate further. Since that can be any byte you wish, you can read the entire flash — one byte at a time.
You need to power cycle the chip before you can progress, so the hardware does involve a bit more than just an SWD interface, and it will take a fair bit more time than reading out a non-protected chip the usual way; plus, of course, the debugging interface needs to be active for this in the first place, which isn’t always the case. However, it still beats paying a few thousand dollars for a factory in China to decap your chip and read it out using a fancy machine.
[Racerxdl] didn’t just write a proof-of-concept for this attack – they implemented it for one of our favourite chips, the RP2040. As such, you no longer need an unobtainium STM32 to dump an unobtainium STM32.
To be clear, [Racerxdl] didn’t design this attack — it’s been around for some time now. Credit for that goes to Johanes Obermaier. All in all, this is a wonderful reminder that seemingly reliable security mechanisms can be foiled by the simplest tricks. For instance, if your chip erases the flash when you unlock its protection, you can just tell it not to.
Top-class hardware and features at an affordable price
Buying a cheap tablet is easy, but finding one with decent specifications and good hardware can be a little more difficult. Nokia released the T20 in late 2021, their first budget-friendly Android tablet and at the end of last year, they announced its successor the T21, which I’ve been using since before Christmas to see if it’s a worthy upgrade.
The T21 looks more premium than the T20 and features a more premium look and finish. The charcoal grey colour has a matte finish with a two-tone effect with a band running across the top of the rear with the flash and camera module on the right and a chrome effect Nokia logo on the left.
I like that the corners are rounded, but not as much as the T20. The bezels are not tiny but are even all the way around and the front-facing camera is housed in the centre on the long edge of the top bezel.
On the left and right edges are two slotted holes for the stereo speakers which offer excellent sound for such a small and slim tablet — the sound quality is much better than I was expecting for such an affordable tablet.
On the bottom right is a 3.5mm headphone jack — a welcome inclusion. The internal DAC isn’t very powerful, so don’t expect power-hungry audiophile headphones to run well although I found more efficient IEMs worked fine in my testing. Also, using the 3.5mm audio cable as an antenna, you can use the T21 to receive FM radio channels.
On the top edge are two holes for the stereo mics. On the left is a volume rocker and on the right is a SIM and microSD card tray. My review variant of the T21 supported WiFi plus 4G — it also comes with a caller app and I was able to make standard phone calls with a SIM installed while at my desk — I’m not suggesting you do this when out and about with your tablet unless you’re using a headset.
The screen is 10.36 inches with a peak brightness of 360 nits, which is too dim for viewing content outside, but perfect for indoors. It supports Wacom Active pens, but I didn’t have one of those to test. Strangely, Nokia doesn’t sell these on their…
China Automotive Cybersecurity Hardware Research Report 2022: OEMs Generally Adopt the Security Chip + HSM Strategy to Build their Cybersecurity Protection System – ResearchAndMarkets.com
DUBLIN–(BUSINESS WIRE)–The “China Automotive Cybersecurity Hardware Research Report, 2022” report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com’s offering.
Security chip and HSM that meet the national encryption standards will build the automotive cybersecurity hardware foundation for China.
OEMs generally adopt the security chip + HSM strategy to build their cybersecurity protection system.
At the core of cybersecurity hardware are security chip and hardware security module (HSM).
Security chip, or secure element (SE), is an integrated circuit that integrates cryptographic algorithms and features physical attack prevention design.
Hardware security module (HSM) is a computer device used to protect and manage the keys and sensitive data applied by the strong authentication system, and also provide related cryptographic operations. It is the basic support for automotive security solutions.
At present, most OEMs employ the security chip + HSM strategy to build an automotive cybersecurity protection system.
For example, in its automotive cybersecurity security system, NIO uses security chips and HSM to reinforce hardware and networks; in terms of secure communication, the HSM and certificate system featuring integrity, encryption, pseudonymization and anonymity is the basis for enabling data privacy protection. In addition, bug fixes over the air (OTA) are available in the case of emergency.
GAC completes the hardware security design and creates the four systems of border protection, automotive security, PKI certification & transmission, and security services, using security chip (SE) + HSM, and secure boot, trusted zone and encryption technologies. And at the vehicle end, GAC conducts in-depth research on vehicle inside and outside multi-node security protections, such as Linux OS for T BOX 4G module, Android OS for vehicle head unit, QNX OS for gateway and MCU, and communication interaction, aiming to establish an in-depth protection system for in-vehicle security.
Homemade SE chips are mass-produced and applied in vehicles.
As the US passed CHIPS Act, the localization of semiconductors in China assumes greater urgency. More chip equipment, materials and…