Improving the Physical Security of Microchips

Nowadays, microchips are virtually everywhere, from simple home devices to confidential military equipment. We must not forget the medical systems that have a great impact on our quality of life as well. As can be seen, the importance of these tiny integrated circuits is immense. Preserving the reliability of these devices and the confidentiality of data these devices are processing is absolutely substantial. The integrated circuit (IC) industry has been rapidly evolving in recent decades and employing ICs is becoming normal and inevitable in nearly all aspects of our lives. The initial IC evolution era paid attention primarily to the technological evolution itself. Aspects like security were always one step back due to the fallacious feeling of the inherent security of these very tiny components. After realizing that the opposite is true, we have to focus on securing the critical devices against tampering, information theft, counterfeiting, etc. In scope of this paper, it means especially hindering of physical attacks on the chips.