Anyway to secure a Xilinx NGC file ?

Hi,

Is there anyway to secure a Xilinx NGC file from being reverse engineered ? Xilinx has a ngc2edif utility to convert the binary ngc file into a readable netlist. Still work of course but makes it a lot easier to copy a design.

So anyway to secure a NGC file ?

Thanks.

Jim

Reply to
fpganut
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Jim,

Copying the bitstream is trivial, so why bother with the NGC?

What is the vulnerability you are analyzing?

Who is your threat? (a major government, or an individual hacker...)

Not knowing what you are trying to protect (and why), we can't provide you with an answer.

Austin

Reply to
austin

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ngc2edif will not extract encrypted cores.

Is it perfectly secure? I'll leave that answer as an exercise for the reader....

'Greg

Reply to
SoyAnarchisto

Copying is fine. I don't care about copies.

I have some circuits implementing some unique algorithms. I don't want someone to figure out the algorithm by extracting the circuit and figuring out how it operates.

A motivated competitor.

Thanks.

Jim

Reply to
fpganut

Is there an encyrption method XST understands?

Reply to
Muzaffer Kal

XST has encryption built in. To get access to the encryption tools, you need to talk to your FAE about becoming part of the Xilinx Alliance Program.

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Regards,

John McCaskill

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Reply to
John McCaskill

Jim,

A motivated competitor has the legal right to reverse engineer your product -- you do need to protect yourself.

A patent would be nice, but often a patent is too expensive, and that may not deter a competitor.

If using Virtex II, IIP, 4, or 5, I suggest the lithium coin cell battery from Ray-O-Vac, and the use of encryption. That is a minium of

15 years of battery life (to 2.0 volts), and since the key is maintained down to less than 1 volt, Ray-O-Vac is unable to extrapolate the lifetime beyond their 2 volt end of life (they said "as close to forever as you can get"). As long as their is reactive lithium in the cell, it is able to push out electrons.

Set top boxes use the lithium battery solution for example (they know how to protect themselves).

If using Spartan, there is no comparable encryption solution.

Some customers use the 3AN (with internal prom) as they feel that has sufficient barriers to reverse engineer (no signal of the configuration appears externally).

Identifying a small part of the design, and reverse engineering just that part is tough, but not unheard of.

The other choice is to hide, or obscure the design as best you can: I know that the crypto community chants "there is no security in obscurity" but obscurity is used by most anyways (causes the thief to look for something easier).

Obscurity is the solution favored by natural evolution (so it does work well enough ...).

Austin

Reply to
austin

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