Visible light techniques in the FinFET era: Challenges, threats and opportunities

This work discusses visible light laser voltage probing (VIS-LVP) and gallium phosphide solid immersion lens (GaP SIL) research for Integrated Circuit (IC) analysis at Technische Universität Berlin. An overview of the challenges in connection with the ultra-precision fabrication of GaP SILs and their application is given. The use of visible light is not only opening a path for fault isolation in small geometry devices, but it also eases access to sensitive data in security relevant IC functions. As previous work has demonstrated that VIS-LVP can be realized with moderate effort, the question is raised if attackers are able to implement visible light attack techniques with moderate or even low cost. To this end, as a first step for attack risk evaluation, a visible light Laser Scanning Microscope (LSM) with a cost of less than 100 $ is presented. The current and future capabilities of such a setup are reviewed and relevant protection concepts are discussed.