4 ms·
After reading through the paper[1] it appears that the only security afforded is an ability to detect energy fluctuations caused by a MITM attacker? A public ch
by dhx 14y ago
After reading through the paper[1] it appears that the only security afforded is an ability to detect energy fluctuations caused by a MITM attacker? A public channel is then assumed to exist to allow both parties to broadcast the monitored energy levels to each other for comparison (evidently over a high bandwidth link and with low latency). A further assumption appears to be made that an attacker is unable to perform a MITM attack on the public broadcast link.
I am naturally sceptical of research of this nature that does not mention:
* practical implementation issues such as the required accuracy of clock synchronisation, required A2D converter parameters, required tolerances for electronic components, etc.
* emanation security/side channel considerations (timing analysis, power analysis and filtering, etc)
* prior work and existing equipment in the space of protected cabling: pressurised cable monitoring, time-domain reflectometry, etc.
[1] http://arxiv.org/pdf/1206.2534v2 http://arxiv.org/pdf/1206.2534v2
- electrograv 14y agoI didn't read the whole paper and I'm no electrical engineer, but I'm also quite skeptical that this works. I'd probably believe it if current propagated infinitely fast, but obviously it doesn't. My first attempt to tap into a channel with this system would be to tap into two points at some distance apart, then measure then changes in current at each point. Since the receiving resistor is flipped randomly and the sending resistor is flipped with the data, it seems to me intuitively that all you need to do to crack this is use a bit of basic electromagnetic physics to derive a formula to extract the data from propagation delays of the effective resistance experienced by the circuit measured at two distant points. I could be wrong though.