Paper 2021/015

SoK: Remote Power Analysis

Macarena Martínez-Rodríguez and Ignacio M. Delgado-Lozano and Billy Bob Brumley

Abstract

In recent years, numerous attacks have appeared that aim to steal secret information from their victim, using the power side channel vector, without direct physical access and using instead, resources that are present inside the victim environment. These attacks are called Remote Power Attacks or Remote Power Analysis. However, there is no unified definition about the limitations that a power attack requires to be defined as remote. This paper aims to propose a unified definition and threat model to clearly differentiate remote power attacks from non-remote ones. Additionally, we collect the main remote power attacks performed so far from the literature, and the principal proposed countermeasures to avoid them. The search of such countermeasures denoted a clear gap in order to find technical details on how to prevent remote power attacks. Thus, the academic community must face an important challenge to avoid this emerging threat, given the clear room for improvement that should be addressed in terms of defense and security of devices that work with private information.