Embedded Security Solution for Digital Safe-Guard Ecosystems

Securing computer systems is perhaps one of the key responsibilities of modern software architects, as well as hardware designers. The research on security issues is getting more important, as the number of embedded and networked computing systems is increasing constantly. Due to strict restrictions and requirements, only special software applications are used in security-critical embedded systems. Consequently, it is necessary to secure those software applications passively by the use of a secure processor architecture. In this paper, we discuss a hardware implementation of a secure processor architecture, as well as adaptations of an existing SPARC V8 processor for the embedded usage in safeguard ecosystems. The main advantage of our concept is the compatibility to new and legacy software applications and hardware architectures. When compared to existing software and hardware solutions, our implementation will result in a noticeable increase in security of embedded computer systems. National and international support programmes, like the European Union framework program IST-FP6, are globally interested in embedded systems security. Moreover, our project is funded by the Austrian Ministry for Technology and Innovation.