IC Reverse Engineering

...well, not really, just out of plain curiosity! ;)

...well, not really, just out of plain curiosity! ;)

A while ago an enthusiastic reader reported on a bold method of taking a peek inside programmed ICs to actually read ROM contents by means of pattern recognition software, provided the architecture and the programming language were known (here [1]). Later, we discovered that this technique had a long story behind it we weren't aware of!

I found some more information in one of my favorite sites [2].

Another interesting approach here [3].

UPDATE (March 4th, 2013):
8085's register file [4], by Ken Shirriff.
Awesome investigation!

Discussion (1 comment)

whiskey Soda 11 years ago

We did a investigation how to protect firmware while producing products in China.

The result was, this is impossible. You can protect the programming aria but you can’t protect the chips in the product.

In China is a company who promise if you send 3 programmed chips, 95% chance that the bring back the hex code.

They don’t have the source code, but for copying the product the hex code will do.

Jaime G.-Arintero 12 years ago

I didn't know about that, really interesting. thanks! The best solution seems to be using a custom chip, "hiding" the architecture. If they only have the hex, a minor difference in the hardware would not allow the chip to work. And they will never get to fix it without the source... I shouldn't ask this but... do you know how much they get for recovering the code in this way? (No, I'm not gonna do it, just feeling curious) These kind of things make industry (even more) unfair :( On another note, I guess someone has thought before on a kind of chip structure that gets damaged by the acid itself... so once you pour acid over the boxing it affects the inner chip also.