SerIOS: Enhancing Hardware Security in Integrated Optoelectronic Systems

TL;DR

SerIOS is a novel framework that enhances hardware security in integrated optoelectronic systems by using optical lithography imperfections for cryptographic keys and attack detection, demonstrating high effectiveness with minimal area overhead.

Contribution

This work introduces SerIOS, the first security framework leveraging optical lithography properties to secure integrated optoelectronic systems against attacks.

Findings

Achieves 100% attack detection rate across scenarios

Maintains small area footprint of less than 15%

Effective in protecting photonic AI accelerators

Abstract

Silicon photonics (SiPh) has different applications, from enabling fast and high-bandwidth communication for high-performance computing systems to realizing energy-efficient optical computation for AI hardware accelerators. However, integrating SiPh with electronic sub-systems can introduce new security vulnerabilities that cannot be adequately addressed using existing hardware security solutions for electronic systems. This paper introduces SerIOS, the first framework aimed at enhancing hardware security in optoelectronic systems by leveraging the unique properties of optical lithography. SerIOS employs cryptographic keys generated based on imperfections in the optical lithography process and an online detection mechanism to detect attacks. Simulation and synthesis results demonstrate SerIOS's effectiveness in detecting and preventing attacks, with a small area footprint of less than 15% and a 100% detection rate across various attack scenarios and optoelectronic architectures, including photonic AI accelerators.