Unequally Powered Cryptography with Physical Unclonable Functions (PUFs)

Description

The technology creates unequally powered cryptography between a server that contains physically unclonable functions (PUFs) and a client device that stores the readings of the same PUFs in look-up tables. Because the server needs greater computing power than the client device, a computing power asymmetry is created. With this technology, the server generates cryptographic keys from the PUFs, injects erratic bits into the keys, and uses the keys to encrypt a known authentication message. Using the look-up tables, the client device processes the cipher received from the server with a strong response-based cryptography (RBC) engine and a powerful computer, uncovers the cryptographic keys, and uses the keys to communicate through encrypted messages. When the environment is hostile, higher levels of erratic bits are injected into the server’s cryptographic keys. Then, the client device increases its computing power to uncover the server’s cryptographic keys, thereby placing attackers with inferior computing power at a strong disadvantage.

Additional information