Information Handling System Tampering Detection via Security Seed
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Solution Overview
Problem
The existing information handling systems lack effective security measures to ensure that hardware and firmware components have not been tampered with during manufacturing, transit, or after delivery to the intended end user, particularly in preventing malicious interceptions or unauthorized access.
Innovation Solution
An information handling system equipped with a processor and a system fingerprint utility that stores a unique system fingerprint, including a security seed, to detect potential tampering by comparing recorded information with real-time data during verification, issuing an alert if discrepancies are found.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If no security measures are implemented, then the system is easier to manufacture and deploy, but the system becomes vulnerable to tampering and malicious interception
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies preliminary action by embedding security seeds and generating system fingerprints during the manufacturing process, before the system is deployed. This allows security verification to be prepared in advance, ensuring that any tampering can be detected without adding complex security mechanisms during operation. The security infrastructure is established upfront, resolving the contradiction between reliability and complexity.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses copying by creating a digital fingerprint (a copy of security-relevant system characteristics) that can be stored and verified separately from the actual hardware. This fingerprint serves as a verifiable copy that can be compared against the original system state, providing security without requiring complex physical security mechanisms on the hardware itself.
2Reliability
If traditional security measures like TPM are used, then software security during transit is improved, but hardware and firmware security remains unprotected
Solution Approach 1:
The patent applies segmentation by dividing the security verification into distinct components: security seeds embedded in hardware components, system fingerprints generated from these seeds, and verification processes that compare fingerprints. This segmentation allows hardware security to be addressed separately from software security mechanisms like TPM, extending protection to firmware and hardware components without creating a monolithic complex security system.
Solution Approach 2:
The patent uses an intermediary approach by introducing system fingerprints as a mediator between the hardware components and the verification process. The fingerprint acts as an intermediary representation of the hardware state that can be securely stored and verified, bridging the gap between hardware security requirements and software-based verification mechanisms.
Data Source
AI summary
In accordance with embodiments of the present disclosure, a method may include storing a system fingerprint of an information handling system, the system fingerprint comprising information associated with one or more information handling resources of the information handling system recorded during creation of the system fingerprint including information regarding a security seed, wherein the security seed comprises a value stored at a location of a non-transitory computer readable medium integral to an information handling resource of the one or more information handling resources. The method may also include during a verification mode, based on the information in the system fingerprint, determining whether potential tampering of the information handling system has occurred, and if potential tampering has occurred, issuing an alert indicating potential tampering with the information handling system.