66PE: new family of security controllers

NEW DELHI - Today at the Smartcards Expo India 2004 show in New Delhi, Infineon Technologies AG, leading supplier of integrated circuits (ICs) for chip cards, announced availability of a new family of security controllers for standard 8-bit and 16-bit chip card applications.

The new "66P Enhanced", or 66PE, family offers intelligent performance management and enhanced security features. It combines proven 0.22-micron chip card IC process technology with the highly flexible and revolutionary on-chip EEPROM technology also used in Infineon's "88 family" of 32-bit chip card controllers.

Advantages of 66PE

The 66PE series is code-compatible with the 66P series, enabling smart card manufacturers to rapidly and easily migrate existing software masks. To accommodate new application software, the new controller family also offers an enhanced instruction set that facilitates access to larger on-chip memories while reducing the code size and increasing the performance of some program sequences by up to 80 percent.





The 66PE internal clock frequency is adjustable according to available power or required performance and runs at up to 33 MHz, which is double the frequency of the predecessor 66P family. To provide maximum performance within specified limits, e.g., 6 mA for 3 V GSM SIM cards, an integrated intelligent power limitation system automatically adapts the chip's internal frequency, resulting in maximum performance during all smart card operations.





In addition, all members of the 66PE family present state-of-the-art security features, such as an active shielding that sends a continuous stream of random data over the surface of the chip. If a change in this data is sensed, the chip initializes an automatic alarm, setting it into a secured state. For chip-internal communication processes, for example between memory areas and processing unit, the 66PE family offers data bus as well as memory encryption. This means that not only the stored data is encrypted, but also every single signal sent on internal data buses. The 66PE family's security features also include an enhanced sensor technique comprising low-voltage and high-voltage sensors, frequency sensors and filters, light and temperature sensors, and glitch sensors. Straightforward RSA (Rivest, Shamir, Adleman) signatures (without Chinese Remainder Theorem, CRT) with key lengths of 1,024 bits are processed in only 130 ms. The on-chip Memory Management and Protection Unit (MMU) separates operating system and application software.


"Designed as a true modular and scalable platform, the 66PE family supports the requirements of today's contact-based and contactless chip card applications," said Dr. Juergen Kuttruff, Vice President and General Manager at the Security business unit of Infineon's Secure Mobile Solutions business group. "It enables easy software migration from existing platforms, and will be a powerful successor to the 66P family, which has achieved a 35 percent share of all chip card ICs shipped since its introduction in the year 2000."