Intel Corporation
Technology To Provide Fault Tolerance For Elliptic Curve Digital Signature Algorithm Engines

Abstract:

A data processing system includes technology for detecting and tolerating faults. The data processing system comprises an electronic control unit (ECU) with a processing core and a fault-tolerant elliptic curve digital signature algorithm (ECDSA) engine. The fault-tolerant ECDSA engine comprises multiple verification state machines (VSMs). The data processing system also comprises nonvolatile storage in communication with the processing core and ECU software in the nonvolatile storage. The ECU software, when executed, enables the data processing system to operate as a node in a distributed data processing system, including receiving digitally signed messages from other nodes in the distributed data processing system. The ECU further comprises a known-answer built-in self-test unit (KA-BISTU). Also, the ECU software comprises fault-tolerant ECDSA engine (FTEE) management software which, when executed by the processing core, utilizes the KA-BISTU to periodically test the fault-tolerant ECDSA engine for faults. Other embodiments are described and claimed.