UCLA EMBEDDED SECURITY GROUP

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ThumbPod: a next generation biometrically secure wireless embedded system

We are presently designing a next generation embedded system named ThumbPod. ThumbPod is an embedded system which will include a microprocessor, a biometric fingerprint sensor (with its associated signal processing hardware), a cryptographic co-processor, and a memory module--all embedded within a single system. ThumbPod will communicate with the outside world via two ports: Infrared (for wireless communication) and USB (for high-bandwidth communication).

ThumbPod will have application in the areas of secure credit cards, secure memory storage, high-bandwidth video/audio encryption, etc. ThumbPod is a driver for our research in hardware and software architectures for low power embedded systems.

The ThumbPod developments span several areas, illustrating the multi-disciplinary nature of our group. The application is developed as a co-design of the following four elements:

The ThumbPod project received an honorable mention award at the 2003 DAC/ISSCC Student Design Contest.

 

The ThumbPod-II project won 3rd place award at the 2005 DAC/ISSCC Student Design Contest

                                  

    ( ThumbPod-2 chip)                                                ( Testing Setup )

 

The following students are involved in the design of Thumbpod: Yi Fan, Alireza Hodjat, David Hwang, Bo-Cheng Lai, Kazua Sakiyama, Patrick Schaumont, Shenglin Yang. The project is advised by Professor Verbauwhede.

Publications
  • D. Hwang, P. Schaumont, K. Tiri, and I. Verbauwhede, "Making embedded systems secure," IEEE Security and Privacy Magazine, 2005. [accepted]
  • P. Schaumont, D. Hwang, I. Verbauwhede, " Platform-based design for an embedded fingerprint authentication device," IEEE Transactions on Computer Aided Design of Integrated Circuits and Systems, 2005. [accepted]
  • Kris Tiri, David Hwang, Alireza Hodjat, Bo-Cheng Lai, Shenglin Yang, Patrick Schaumont, and Ingrid Verbauwhede, "Prototype IC with WDDL and Differential Routing - DPA Resistance Assessment,” Workshop on Cryptographic Hardware and Embedded Systems (CHES 2005), August 2005. [accepted]
  • Kris Tiri, David Hwang, Alireza Hodjat, Bo-Cheng Lai, Shenglin Yang, Patrick Schaumont, and Ingrid Verbauwhede, "AES-Based Cryptographic and Biometric Security Coprocessor IC in 0.18-um CMOS Resistant to Side-Channel Power Analysis Attacks," 2005 Symposia on VLSI Technology and Circuits (VLSI SYMPOSIUM 2005), June 2005. [accepted]
  • Kris Tiri, David Hwang, Alireza Hodjat, Bo-Cheng Lai, Shenglin Yang, Patrick Schaumont, and Ingrid Verbauwhede, "A Side-Channel Leakage Free Coprocessor IC in 0.18um CMOS for Embedded AES-based Cryptographic and Biometric Processing," Proc. 2005 Design Automation Conference (DAC 2005), June 2005. [accepted] (Winner DAC/ISSCC 2005 Student Design Contest 3rd place operational category)
  • S. Yang and I. Verbauwhede, "Automatic Secure Fingerprint Verification System Based on Fuzzy Vault Scheme,” IEEE International Conference on Acoustics, Speech, and Signal Processing (ICASSP 2005), pp. 609-612, March 2005. PDF
  • D. Hwang and I. Verbauwhede, "Design of portable biometric authenticators--energy, performance, and security tradeoffs," IEEE Transactions on Consumer Electronics, vol. 50, no. 4, pp. 1222-1231, November 2004. PDF
  • S. Yang and I. Verbauwhede, "Secure fuzzy vault based fingerprint verification system," Proc. 38th Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems, and Computers, Volume 1, pp. 577-581, November 2004. PDF
  • P. Schaumont and I. Verbauwhede, "Thumbpod puts security under your thumb," Xilinx Xcell Journal, October 2003 (Winter 2004). PDF
  • P. Schaumont, and I. Verbauwhede, "Domain specific codesign for embedded security," IEEE Computer, vol. 36, no. 4, pp. 68-74, April 2003. PDF
  • P. Schaumont, K. Sakiyama, Y. Fan, D. Hwang, B. Lai, A. Hodjat, S. Yang, and I. Verbauwhede, "Testing ThumbPod: softcore bugs are hard to find," Proc. IEEE International High Level Design Validation and Test Workshop (HLDVT 2003), pp. 77-82, November 2003. PDF
  • S. Yang and I. Verbauwhede, "A secure fingerprint matching technique," Proc. ACM Workshop on Biometrics: Methods and Applications, pp. 89-94, November 2003. PDF
  • S. Yang, K. Sakiyama, and I. Verbauwhede, "A compact and efficient fingerprint verification system for secure embedded systems," Proc. 37th IEEE Asilomar Conference on Signals, Systems, and Computers, pp. 2058-2062, November 2003. PDF
  • D. Hwang, P. Schaumont, Y. Fan, A. Hodjat, B.C. Lai, K. Sakiyama, S. Yang, and I. Verbauwhede, "Design flow for HW / SW acceleration transparency in the ThumbPod secure embedded system," Proc. 40th ACM/IEEE Design Automation Conference (DAC 2003), pp. 60-65, June 2003. PDF
  • P. Schaumont and I. Verbauwhede, "Domain specific tools and methods for application in security processor design," Kluwer Journal for Design Automation of Embedded Systems, pp. 365-383, November 2002. PDF

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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