This made me think of CPU inspection for security purposes… is the chip actually designed the way that they say it is? With a good microscope you can inspect their work, but I wonder if this microscope design has limitations that would prevent it from being used that way.
The most difficult and expensive part seems to be finding something you can actually measure. The particular type of graphite [Dan] used costs $20 for a playing card size. Gold also works if you can get it flat enough. Most metals are tricky because they require an oxygen-free (vacuum) environment. Most non-metals will not work at all because they are not conductive.
This made me think of CPU inspection for security purposes… is the chip actually designed the way that they say it is?
That’s the exact reason I’m collecting this stuff. For materials, too, as I speculated modifying the materials could lead to attacks. Strangely, a brilliant engineer in mixed-signal ASIC’s argued that they’d more likely go for the design because fab or RF level modifications might be too hard. It’s the only time I got one over on him when papers were posted showing fab-level, analog-level, and RF-level hacks weakening security. There was also the attack I invented turning a monitor cable into an emanation attack that NSA either ripped off me or independently invented. Codename RAGEMASTER.
Many of these things use different materials that will look different under electron microscopes and such. So gotta collect detection mechanisms in case they’re ever useful.
This made me think of CPU inspection for security purposes… is the chip actually designed the way that they say it is? With a good microscope you can inspect their work, but I wonder if this microscope design has limitations that would prevent it from being used that way.
Still, very cool.
That’s the exact reason I’m collecting this stuff. For materials, too, as I speculated modifying the materials could lead to attacks. Strangely, a brilliant engineer in mixed-signal ASIC’s argued that they’d more likely go for the design because fab or RF level modifications might be too hard. It’s the only time I got one over on him when papers were posted showing fab-level, analog-level, and RF-level hacks weakening security. There was also the attack I invented turning a monitor cable into an emanation attack that NSA either ripped off me or independently invented. Codename RAGEMASTER.
Many of these things use different materials that will look different under electron microscopes and such. So gotta collect detection mechanisms in case they’re ever useful.
That is awesome! I remember studying about those microscopes a few years ago back at the university. Then, I found out about this website: https://web.archive.org/web/20121107205242/http://www.geocities.com/spm_stm/Project.html , but the descriptions there are not precise.
It’s great that someone has made a more detailed tutorial.
For those interested, I also found these links:
https://openafm.com/
http://shop.stromlinet-nano.com/products/stromlingo-diy-afm-kit