Selective Memory Encryption Wear Leveling
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Solution Overview
Problem
Full disk encryption techniques that encrypt both used and unused portions of solid-state drives prematurely age the storage device, leading to unnecessary wear and degradation of read and write access times due to excessive programming and wear leveling operations.
Innovation Solution
A method that accesses an address map of a memory device to designate only the used memory locations for encryption, avoiding encryption of empty or unused locations, thereby reducing the number of read and write cycles and preventing unnecessary expansion of wear leveling tables.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If full disk encryption encrypts both used and unused portions of memory device, then data security is improved, but memory device wear increases and life span decreases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the memory device into used portions (containing actual data) and unused portions (empty or deleted data), and applies encryption selectively only to the used portions. This segmentation allows the system to maintain data security for actual data while avoiding unnecessary encryption operations on unused portions, thereby reducing wear on the memory device and extending its lifespan.
2Reliability
If full disk encryption encrypts all memory locations, then encryption coverage is improved, but read and write access times degrade
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies partial encryption by encrypting only the necessary used portions of the memory device rather than all memory locations. This partial action approach maintains adequate encryption coverage for actual data while significantly reducing the number of encryption operations, thereby improving read and write access times without compromising security of stored data.
3Reliability
If full disk encryption is performed on solid-state drive, then data protection is improved, but wear leveling table expansion increases
Solution Approach 1:
The patent segments the memory device into used and unused portions and applies encryption only to the used portions. This selective approach prevents unnecessary expansion of the wear leveling table that would occur if all memory locations were encrypted, thereby maintaining data protection while avoiding increased device complexity and table expansion.
Data Source
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AI summary
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for encryption of a memory device with wear leveling. In one aspect, a method includes accessing an address map of the memory device, the address map referencing first memory locations and second memory locations of the memory device, wherein the first memory locations store data that are to be encrypted by a full disk encryption operation on the memory device; designating the second memory locations as being encrypted without performing an encryption operation on the second memory locations; and encrypting only the data stored in the first memory locations of the memory device so that the data of the first memory locations and the second memory locations are designated as being disk encrypted.