Hardware Secret Passcode Hash Verification
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing authentication methods face challenges in balancing security and usability, as users often select easy-to-remember passwords and PINs, making them vulnerable to automated guessing attacks, and current systems struggle to prevent unauthorized access while maintaining user convenience.
Innovation Solution
The use of a hardware secret to calculate and store passcode hashes, which are then verified against a database, ensuring that even if an attacker gains access to the device, the computational resources required to guess the passcode are excessive due to a large set of possible hardware secrets and iterative calculations, making cryptographic attacks infeasible.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If users select easy-to-remember passwords and PINs, then usability is improved, but security deteriorates due to vulnerability to automated guessing attacks
Solution Approach 1:
The patent introduces a hardware secret as an intermediary element that mediates between the user's passcode and the authentication system. The hardware secret is used to generate a unique hash function that transforms the passcode into a cryptographic hash. This intermediary mechanism allows users to choose memorable passcodes while the hardware secret ensures that the actual authentication relies on computationally infeasible cryptographic operations, thus resolving the contradiction between usability and security.
2Reliability
If a large set of hardware secrets with iterative calculations is used, then security is improved by making cryptographic attacks infeasible, but device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by pre-provisioning each device with a unique hardware secret during manufacturing. This hardware secret is embedded in the device's hardware and used to generate a unique hash function. The iterative calculations are also pre-configured into the hash function's structure. By performing these security-critical operations in advance during device provisioning, the system achieves high security without adding operational complexity during authentication, as the complex operations are already baked into the device's hardware architecture.
Data Source
AI summary
A hardware secret is securely maintained in a computing device. The hardware secret is used to generate a hash of a passcode that is persistently stored for later use in verification. When a passcode is received as part of an authentication attempt, the hardware secret is used to generate a reference hash of the received passcode that is then compared with the persistently stored hash to determine whether there is a match.