Proof That Military Chips From China Are Infected?

For years, everyone has warned that counterfeit microchips made in China and installed on American military hardware could contain viruses or secret backdoors granting the Chinese military cyber access to  U.S. weapons systems. These warnings/predictions recently expanded beyond counterfeit parts, now we’re worried that any Chinese-made components could be infected. The problem was that until this week, these warnings were educated guesses and theories. Well, a scientist at Cambridge University in the United Kingdom claims to have developed a software program proving that China — and anyone else — can, and is, installing cyber backdoors on some of the world’s most secure, “military grade” microchips.

Specifically, the  American-designed, Chinese-made Actel/Microsemi ProASIC3 A3P250 — commonly known as the PA3 — chip was found by Cambridge researcher, Sergei Skorobogatov, to have a backdoor, or trojan, deliberately built into it. The PA3 is what’s called a Field Reprogrammable Gate Array (FRGA); an almost blank slate of a microchip that can be programmed by its owner to perform a variety of tasks.

Most alarming is that the PA3 is considered to be one of the “most impenetrable” designs on the market. The chip is used in military “weapons, guidance, flight control, networking and communications” hardware, according to Skorobogatov’s report on his findings that was published last weekend. The PA3 is also used in civilian “nuclear power plants, power distribution, aerospace, aviation, public transport and automotive products,” according to Skorobogatov.


http://defensetech.org/2012/05/30/smoking-gun-proof-that-military-chips-from-china-are-infected/

Good Hunting.

MR