Secure and interference-robust ISO/IEC 18000-63 compatible UHF-RFID tags by cryptographic authentication primitives

Abstract

Secure ISO/IEC 18000-63 compatible UHF tags have big applications and advantages in present-day logistics or transportation systems. This paper discusses two solutions for secure UHF-RFID tags supporting cryptographical authentication. The first solution is based on a strong Rabin-Montgomery public-key cryptosystem using long integer square operation for the public-key encryption of a tag ID. A second solution is based on an alternative cryptographic technology to provide secure authentication and encryption. It is motivated by the required interference robustness of UHF-RFID tags in the dedicated frequency range and resource limitations as they are often present in embedded security scenarios and RFID devices. We investigate and suggest the implementation of a low hardware complexity cryptosystem for lightweight symmetric key exchange and authentication as well as encryption based on Tree Parity Machine Rekeying Architectures (TPMRAs). First, characteristics of standard-cell ASIC design realisations in 0.18 μ CMOS technology are evaluated and an FPGA-based secure UHF-RFID prototype is presented which demonstrates the feasibility of the suggested public-key cryptosystem.