Verayo Launches, Introduces Security Solutions Based on "Unclonable" Silicon Chips

-- Verayo, a security and authentication technology provider, today introduced security solutions based on “unclonable” silicon chips. The core technology that makes these silicon chips unclonable is called Physical Unclonable Functions (PUF). PUF is like a biometrics technology for silicon chips. It extracts a type of “electronic DNA or fingerprint” that is unique to each silicon chip, and uses it for authentication and security applications. It is effectively impossible to model or copy the electronic DNA in another chip, which makes PUF-based solutions more secure and robust. PUF technology was invented at MIT and Verayo has the worldwide exclusive license to develop and market PUF-based silicon chips.

Verayo is bringing to market two broad categories of security solutions based on PUF technology – authentication and secret key generation.

Verayo’s authentication solutions exploit the electronic DNA of silicon chips to authenticate them, and can be easily integrated into many kinds of silicon chips, as complex as microprocessors, FPGAs, ASICs, smart cards, as well as simple passive RFID. These solutions provide strong and robust authentication of electronic equipment, luxury brand products, pharmaceuticals, secure IDs, passports and documents.

Conventional security solutions require storing of keys on the silicon. The security of the entire system depends on the integrity of these stored keys. Verayo's key generation solution eliminates the need for stored keys. Using unique electronic DNA or fingerprint of the silicon chips it dynamically generates a virtually unlimited number of secret keys. This significantly enhances the security and flexibility of secure systems, such as smart cards, NFC cards, SIM cards, trusted processors commonly used for financial transactions, service provisioning and trusted computing.

“PUF technology exploits the physical characteristics of the silicon and IC manufacturing process variations to uniquely characterize each and every silicon chip, this provides a secure, low-cost mechanism to authenticate silicon chips,” said Professor Srini Devadas, co-founder and CTO of Verayo.

“By bringing this one-of-a-kind technology to the market, we are confident that we will change the landscape for authentication and security,” said Anant Agrawal, CEO of Verayo. “Our RFID products will define the new barriers for counterfeiters, and the key generation products will bring unprecedented security, trust and flexibility in the world of trusted computing.”

Verayo is introducing the world’s first ever “unclonable” RFID chip at the RFID World conference in Las Vegas on September 9, 2008. Verayo’s unclonable RFID provide a strong, robust and cost-effective solution to fight this counterfeiting menace. Verayo CEO Anant Agrawal will deliver the Industry Address at the RFID World conference.

About Verayo

Verayo was founded in Silicon Valley in 2005. The company is focused on building security and authentication solutions based on Silicon Physical Unclonable Functions (PUF) technology, which was invented and first implemented at MIT by Prof. Srini Devadas and his team. Since its founding, the Verayo team has designed, built, and tested ICs using PUFs and built-up a growing body of additional IP and substantive know-how beyond the initial IP that Verayo licensed exclusively from MIT. Verayo is funded by Khosla Ventures and has assembled an experienced Advisory Board drawn from the semiconductor and security industries. In addition to developing commercial products, the company is working on projects for various U.S. Defense Agencies.