Security in RFID Systems: Theory and practice for enhancing security in RFID systems

The thesis addresses the topic of security and privacy for RFID systems. The current state of the art on RFID technology is presented, along with a brief overview of the physical principles governing such systems. A description of the concepts of security and privacy and potential problems in RFID systems due to lack thereof follows. Within this framework, two components are presented and proposed as solutions for the aforementioned problems. The first is a hardware/software platform for privacy protection of end users of RFID systems. It selectively jams the electromagnetic signals used for communication between components of an RFID system, thus preventing undesired access to private data. The second component is a circuit that can be integrated in RFID chips in order to enhance their level of security. It generates a digital signature using properties of elliptic curves that cannot easily be reverse engineered, thus offering trustworthy means of authenticating the hosting chip. Both components take the attributes of a typical RFID system into account, in order to demonstrate the feasibility of implementing acceptable solutions for existing RFID systems.Microelectronics & Computer EngineeringElectrical Engineering, Mathematics and Computer Scienc