Experimental Testbed for Electromagnetic Analysis
Date
2016-03-29
Authors
Katamreddy, Sangamitrareddy
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Abstract
The electromagnetic fields are generated by electronic devices dictated by the laws of Electromagnetism. These electromagnetic fields in the radio frequency (RF) spectrum disrupt the operation of other neighboring electronic devices. This disruption is called Electro-Magnetic Interference (EMI). The physical characteristics of electronic devices like timing, power consumptions, sound acoustics, temperature variations, electromagnetic fields etc., unintentionally leak secret information because they are correlated to the data being processed by the elctronic device. These characteristics of the electronic device are called side-channels. Side Channel Attack (SCA) make use of these side channels to reveal the secret information. Side channel attacks are focused on the implementation the of the algorithm and not the mathematical weakness of the algorithm. In Electro-Magnetic Analysis (EMA), the RF electromagnetic fields around the electronic device are measured and used for side channel attack. In EMA the origin of electromagentic field, the frequency spectrum of the electromagnetic field and techniques used to capture the electromagnetic field are also studied. The main purpose of the thesis is to design and build an experimental test bed for electromagnetic analysis. The experimental test bed consists of a motorized 2D scanner, electromagnetic field sensors and amplifiers. First, the theoretical background behind the origin of RF electromagnetic fields around electronic devices and the dependency of the electromagnetic fields on the data being processed is presented. Generic side-channel analysis techniques using electromagnetic field measurements are discussed. Later, the construction of the motorized 2D scanner is explained. Then the electromagnetic sensors built are characterized in frequency domain.
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Keywords
Electromagnetic analysis, 2D scanner, Side channel analysis, Magnetic field probes, Power analysis