Voltage Glitch Attacks on Mixed-Signal Systems

Supply voltage glitches are a well-known fault injection method used to attack electronic circuits. The aim of this paper is to identify the specific threats of mixed-signal systems and to provide some solutions to ensure their security. Indeed, many Systems on Chip use both analog and digital circuits but, most of the time, the security of such application is considered only from an exclusively digital or sometimes analog point of view. However, in mixed-signals systems, analog and digital solutions coexist and must be considered as a unique system to ensure the security of the whole application. In this purpose, this paper gives an overview of voltage glitch attacks effects and countermeasures for analog and digital blocks as part of Mixed-Signal SoCs (AMS-SoCs). It also emphasizes the unique behavior of mixed-signal circuits during glitch attacks and suggest some guidelines to associate efficiently analog and digital solutions to secure a mixed-signal system.