Cell Broadband Engine processor vault security architecture

Abstract

Current data protection technologies such as those based on public-key encryption and broadcast encryption focus on the secure control and protection of data. Although these protection schemes are effective and mathematically sound, they are susceptible to systematic attacks that utilize any underlying platform weakness, bypassing the cryptographic strengths of the actual schemes. Thus, ensuring that the computing platform supports the cryptographic data protection layers is a critical issue. The Cell Broadband Engine™ (Cell/B.E.) processor security architecture has three core features that are well suited for this purpose. It provides hardware-enforced process isolation in which code and data can execute in physically isolated memory space. It also provides the ability to perform hardware-supported authentication of any software stack (i.e., “secure boot”) during runtime. Finally, the architecture provides a hardware key to act as the root of an encryption chain. Data encrypted directly or indirectly by this key can be decrypted and provided only to an application that is running in the isolated memory and that has been verified. This significantly reduces an adversary's chances of manipulating software to expose the key that is fundamental to a data protection or authentication scheme. Furthermore, it provides a foundation for an application to attest itself to a remote party by demonstrating access to a secret.