Hardware Security
Which describes a fault injection attack?
- AAn attack that briefly disturbs supply voltage or clock or shines a laser to make a chip malfunction, skipping authentication or inferring keys
- BThe task of counting bugs in a program
- CA test finding chips broken by manufacturing defects
Show answer and explanation
Answer: A. An attack that briefly disturbs supply voltage or clock or shines a laser to make a chip malfunction, skipping authentication or inferring keys
Chips are designed to work correctly within specified voltage and clock ranges. A fault injection attack deliberately induces malfunctions by briefly dropping the supply voltage, inserting a short glitch into the clock, or applying a laser or electromagnetic pulse. It is known that this can skip a comparison instruction to bypass signature verification, or reveal keys by comparing faulty and correct cryptographic outputs.
- A. Correct. It deliberately induces malfunctions.
- B. It is not bug counting.
- C. Its purpose differs from manufacturing tests.