Efficient Modeling Attack on Multiplexer PUFs via Kronecker Matrix Multiplication
Hongfei Wang, Caixue Wan, Hai Jin · IEEE Transactions on Computer-Aided Design of Integrated Circuits and Systems · 2025
The physical unclonable function (PUF) is valued for its lightweight nature and unique functionality, making it a common choice for securing hardware products requiring authentication and key generation mechanisms. In response to the susceptibility of individual PUFs to modeling attacks, advanced PUF variants have been developed to improve security measures. One notable type in this regard is the multiplexer-based composition of arbiter PUFs, known as MPUF, which aims to meet high reliability and security standards simultaneously. Current research on attacking MPUF encounters challenges, such as substantial demands for training CRPs and low success rates. In this work, we propose a novel numerical modeling attack strategy for MPUFs. Using Kronecker products from mathematical perspective, this method precisely describes the MPUF model without using complex network architectures, boosting attack accuracy, and overall efficiency. Experiment comparison with state-of-the-art works demonstrates that our method achieves better performance in terms of attack accuracy, robustness, and efficiency. Our method is able to successfully attack a (512, 8)-MPUF in 32.71 min with 97.14% accuracy, outperforming all existing attack methods on MPUFs. More, we validate our method through experiments with hardware implementations on FPGAs. The advantages of our method also include the adaptability to be employed to attack other MPUF variations like cMPUF and rMPUF, and the capability to be integrated with an existing attack method for launching efficient attack on MPUFs leveraging reliability information.