Security solutions for crypto are broken

Crypto key storage, management, and usage solutions, including hardware wallets, rely on “off-the-shelf” semiconductor chips. Unfortunately, no company produces chips tailored for this market. Therefore, the crypto market must adapt chips designed for consumer electronics, centralized banking, or other more general applications. These off-the-shelf chips were NOT designed for the specific needs of a rapidly evolving crypto market with sophisticated security needs.

Some critical shortcomings of these generic chips include:

• Inadequate Cryptographic Primitives: The chips often use outdated or inappropriate cryptographic algorithms.
• Vulnerable Memory: These chips feature non-secure memory structures that compromise chip performance.
• Archaic Single-Key Systems: Many rely on the obsolete single-key approaches, lacking advanced security measures.
• Closed Architectures: The solutions are often closed and proprietary, lacking transparency.
• Restrictive NDAs: Non-disclosure agreements limit access to critical architectural details and hinder innovation.
• Insufficient Protection: There is little to no protection for CPU/MCU capabilities, such as physical countermeasures to shield against attacks.

Blending crypto and semiconductor cultures

There is also the issue that crypto and semiconductor worlds have different “cultures” and need to be harmonized to design and fabricate a commercially viable chip. The CrossBar team brings together experts with diverse backgrounds in the fields of semiconductor development, physical countermeasure implementation, cryptography, secure non-volatile memories, security standards certification, software, and system development to revolutionize semiconductor solutions targeting secure transactions in the crypto world.