Ledger researchers bypass RP2350 secure debug with laser fault injection
Photon-emission microscopy and targeted laser pulses defeated Raspberry Pi's debug lockout on the A4 revision microcontroller.
What to know
- Ledger researchers defeated the RP2350 A4's permanent debug lockout using photon-emission microscopy to locate target registers, then laser pulses to flip security bits.
- The attack recovered secrets from one-time-programmable memory by exploiting a timing gap: a reset halted the chip before firmware could apply runtime locks.
- Physical access and ~$250k in specialized lab equipment are required, though commenters note serious security labs already own such tools and cheaper alternatives may exist.
- Raspberry Pi released the A4 revision after vulnerabilities emerged in the original chip during its formal hacking challenge; this attack shows the arms race between attackers and defenders continues.
The dispute Whether the $250k equipment cost is a genuine barrier to exploitation or simply a reflection of initial research-grade tool costs that could be amortized across many samples or replaced with cheaper alternatives. · positions read across 10 posts and comments
The $250k cost is not as prohibitive as it sounds; serious security labs already have the equipment, and cheaper home-lab alternatives exist.
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“Definitely doable in a home lab for under $25k in equipment, likely under $10k.”
BitBangingBytes · Hacker News ↗
The attack is technically impressive but practically limited by its physical access and equipment requirements.
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“The attack requires physical access, destructive preparation, and approximately $250,000 of laboratory equipment. Not super practical, but neat attack”
stackghost · Hacker News ↗
This is part of an ongoing security arms race; vulnerabilities in one generation will inform improvements in the next.
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“The RP2350's secure enclave made it particularly attractive for use as a Yubikey alternative. There will always be an arms race between safe-crackers and safe-builders.”
byb · Hacker News ↗
Ledger Donjon Security research teamRaspberry Pi Microcontroller manufacturer
The record 1 articles and posts · last 6 days
What people are saying 9 voices from 1 site · best of 10 · verbatim
- Sep 19
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I'm confused by a number of comments here and the article seemingly taking a position that a $250k lab instrument is required.For one a similar instrument can be constructed from surplus parts for far less. Secondly, it's a single bit flip required. Now knowing the the technique works, a harness could be built that attempts it scattershot without…
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The RP2350 is Raspberry Pi’s dual-core microcontroller: each processor socket can select either an Arm Cortex-M33 or a RISC-V Hazard3 core at boot.Does that mean there are four cores on the die? Is there crazy amounts of MUXing going on? Does the extra, semi-unused area give the chip a premium price tag? Or did I misinterpret this?
- Sep 18
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I have an application on an SPC58 that I really want to know more about. But unfortunately; it’s a dual core with lockstep. So if it could be done; I think that automatically double-pluses the budget.
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Impressive work!I have a side question. I looked into the linked Raspberry Pi hacking challenge, and there's something very basic I couldn't figure out: It looks like the relevant script in the repo just writes 0xc0ff 0xffee a few times to the OTP as the "secret" to unlock. But given that $20000 was up for grabs, this can't possibly be the genuine…
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Nice, thanks. I had wondered whether the $250K in lab gear is something that a serious HW security lab would already have on hand, as opposed to specialized expenditure for just this attack. I mean I rode in a $250K(?) motor vehicle a few days ago (the #2 SF Muni bus towards the Marina) but I didn't have to spend a lot to ride it, since it was…
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The RP2350's secure enclave made it particularly attractive for use as a Yubikey alternative.There will always be an arms race between safe-crackers and safe-builders. Presumably the lessons learned will help make the next generation tougher to break into.
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I appreciate all the details they provide in the post. The $250k in lab gear is useful when initially discovering, exploiting and documenting attacks like this.Definitely doable in a home lab for under $25k in equipment, likely under $10k.Same as my replicating Colin O’Flynn’s BAM BAM attack on a MPC5566 chip, he used a ChipShouter ($5,000) and I…
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That's reminiscent of when we first found out that if you opened up dram chips you could use them for imaging. Of course the scale at which this is done is extremely impressive.
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> The attack requires physical access, destructive preparation, and approximately $250,000 of laboratory equipment.Not super practical, but neat attack