Tamper-proof hardware;  Secure hardware

Trusted Hardware is a broad term used to denote any hardware that has been certified to perform according to a certain set of requirements. Most often however, “trusted hardware” is discussed in adversarial contexts. The term has thus been somewhat hijacked to mean “tamper-proof” hardware, i.e., hardware designed to resist direct physical access adversaries. Often trusted hardware encompasses some cryptographic abilities, i.e., performing encryption and data authentication.

Certification. The National Institute of Standards has established a set of standards for security requirements of cryptographic modules and specifically for physical properties and tamper-resistance thereof [2]. The FIPS 140–2 Level 4 certification is at present the highest-attainable hardware security in sensitive, non-classified domains. While a plethora of devices have undergone FIPS certification, the most common types of trusted hardware...