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Technology for Trusted Circuits

Award Information
Agency: Department of Defense
Branch: Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
Contract: W31P4Q-07-C-0010
Agency Tracking Number: O043-TC1-6007
Amount: $746,498.00
Phase: Phase II
Program: SBIR
Solicitation Topic Code: OSD04-TC1
Solicitation Number: 2004.3
Timeline
Solicitation Year: 2004
Award Year: 2007
Award Start Date (Proposal Award Date): 2007-03-21
Award End Date (Contract End Date): 2009-06-30
Small Business Information
2851 Commerce Street
Blacksburg, VA 24060
United States
DUNS: 627132913
HUBZone Owned: Yes
Woman Owned: No
Socially and Economically Disadvantaged: No
Principal Investigator
 Jonathan Graf
 Principal Investigator
 (540) 953-4270
 submissions@lunainnovations.com
Business Contact
 Wendy Williams
Title: Director of Contracts
Phone: (540) 557-5898
Email: submissions@lunainnovations.com
Research Institution
N/A
Abstract

The goal of this project is to protect DOD FPGA technology from malicious circuitry embedded in the FPGA device during manufacture. Most defense equipment contains some type of microelectronic device such as an application specific integrated circuit or a field programmable gate array. Due to the exponentially rising cost of microelectronics manufacturing and the lower demand for military-spec parts, many of these chips are commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) devices that are manufactured overseas even if the design is done within the United States of America. The possibility exists, therefore, that a skilled foreign attacker can modify the circuit between the original design tapeout and its fabrication. Such modifications might add a backdoor into the chip, create a “time-bomb” which disables or alters the device function after a set time, or release a virus or worm behind a network’s firewall. The goal of this Phase II SBIR project is to investigate methods of detecting such malicious circuitry. Our effort places particular emphasis on FPGA technology since the hardware-reconfigurable properties of FPGAs make them excellent and increasingly utilized solutions to military-specific computing needs. FPGA-based solutions under investigation also include advanced run-time reconfiguration technologies to determine chip trustworthiness and obfuscate chip function.

* Information listed above is at the time of submission. *

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