RunPBA -- Runtime attestation for microcontrollers with PACBTI
Andr\'e Cirne, Patr\'icia R. Sousa, Jo\~ao S. Resende, Lu\'is Antunes

TL;DR
RunPBA is a hardware-based runtime attestation system for microcontrollers that uses PACBTI to defend against control flow attacks with minimal performance overhead, suitable for resource-constrained embedded devices.
Contribution
It introduces PACBTI, a novel processor extension for Arm Cortex M processors, enabling secure runtime attestation without hardware modifications.
Findings
Imposes only 1% and 4.7% performance overhead on benchmarks
Demonstrates effective control flow attack mitigation
Suitable for real-world embedded systems
Abstract
The widespread adoption of embedded systems has led to their deployment in critical real-world applications, making them attractive targets for malicious actors. These devices face unique challenges in mitigating vulnerabilities due to intrinsic constraints, such as low energy consumption requirements and limited computational resources. This paper presents RunPBA, a hardware-based runtime attestation system designed to defend against control flow attacks while maintaining minimal performance overhead and adhering to strict power consumption constraints. RunPBA leverages PACBTI, a new processor extension tailored for the Arm Cortex M processor family, allowing robust protection without requiring hardware modifications, a limitation present in similar solutions. We implemented a proof-of-concept and evaluated it using two benchmark suites. Experimental results indicate that RunPBA…
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Taxonomy
TopicsSecurity and Verification in Computing · Cryptographic Implementations and Security · Real-Time Systems Scheduling
