Secure Element in Hardware Wallets - page 5.

dkbit98

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Quote from: malevolent on December 17, 2021, 07:56:16 PM

Thankfully the whole Bitcoin space/ecosystem is more mature and varied now, any rug pull involving a major hardware wallet provider would be limited in damage.

I have a feeling it's not mature enough, and bigger one hardware wallet manufacturer gets it increases the risk.
It's enough to shop how mature and pro company is when all private customer information is leaked online Tongue

Nice little article about Secure Elements explaining how they work, and what disadvantages/advantages they have.
Like we talked before, biggest issue with secure elements is the fact that most of them are still closed source and we can't really verify chip security.
Second problem is all the Certification levels, that makes customer having to trust companies who are evaluating all this.
Having said that I noticed that ledger recently changed their certification to EALS+ and I can't find any information about that anywhere on internet...

They suggest best way for solving this problems and disadvantages is with using multi-vendor multisig with multiple hardware wallets.
https://unchained.com/blog/bitcoin-what-is-a-secure-element/

malevolent

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Quote from: giszmo on December 11, 2021, 10:35:47 PM

As you can see in my footer, I work on WalletScrutiny where my primary goal is to prevent rug pulls as I see them as a systemic risk if we get another MtGox situation where half the community is affected. Reliance on a compromised TRNG is one of my big concerns.

Thankfully the whole Bitcoin space/ecosystem is more mature and varied now, any rug pull involving a major hardware wallet provider would be limited in damage.

JL0

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Quote from: dkbit98 on December 13, 2021, 08:23:34 AM

Quote from: JL0 on December 12, 2021, 03:15:45 PM

Trezor releasing their new device with SE in 2022? Any ETA?

Nobody knows exact date and time especially with global chips shortage and problems with supply chain, but it is planned for the end of 2022.
You can follow Trezor Tropic Square for news, and I will probably post any new information I hear in due time here.
Important thing here is that this would be the first open source secure element, without secret NDAs signed.

List is updated and new secure element ST33K1M5C added for ledger Nano S Plus device that is not yet officially released.
I also made separate entries for currently available ledger hardware wallets because they all have different secure elements.

Thank you.

dkbit98

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Quote from: JL0 on December 12, 2021, 03:15:45 PM

Trezor releasing their new device with SE in 2022? Any ETA?

Nobody knows exact date and time especially with global chips shortage and problems with supply chain, but it is planned for the end of 2022.
You can follow Trezor Tropic Square for news, and I will probably post any new information I hear in due time here.
Important thing here is that this would be the first open source secure element, without secret NDAs signed.

List is updated and new secure element ST33K1M5C added for ledger Nano S Plus device that is not yet officially released.
I also made separate entries for currently available ledger hardware wallets because they all have different secure elements.

JL0

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Trezor releasing their new device with SE in 2022? Any ETA?

dkbit98

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Quote from: giszmo on December 11, 2021, 10:35:47 PM

OP presents SEs as green/good and lack thereof as red/bad. I agree that there is certain situations where a SE can save the day but equally does the SE with their NDA-requirement and secrecy lead to a situation where we trust a black box a whole lot for being our own bank and throw "don't trust - verify" too easily over board.

I was neutral in this case, and I simply showed a color, green generally means GO, red color means STOP in traffic, but there is nothing good or bad about that.
I can also say that tomato is red and cucumber is green, but that doesn't mean either of them are good or bad.
If you read what I wrote, I actually said that secure elements can potentially be exploited by malicious firmware updates, and I wrote many times about dangers of hidden NDAs.

Quote from: giszmo on December 11, 2021, 10:35:47 PM

Especially hardware wallets that use their SE's TRNG as sole source of entropy should be called out! Nobody can prove the TRNG to be truly random and in the worst case it just creates hash("you won't guess this", serialNumber, sequenceNumber) "random" numbers that the inventor can trivially guess. Such a hardware wallet would allow the provider to know all the private keys generated by all the users, putting him in the position of being able to pull the rug at any time.

I already wrote a topic about Seed Generation in Hardware Wallets including entropy, and I am somehow aware of flaws with random generation (TRNG, HRNG, PRNG) but I am not at all expert and I don't understand deeply how they actually work.
You are free to contribute this or any other of my topics and correct any potential mistakes I made:
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/seed-generation-in-hardware-wallets-5317199

Quote from: giszmo on December 11, 2021, 10:35:47 PM

As you can see in my footer, I work on WalletScrutiny where my primary goal is to prevent rug pulls as I see them as a systemic risk if we get another MtGox situation where half the community is affected. Reliance on a compromised TRNG is one of my big concerns.

I know your work, but I doubt MtGox can be repeated with hardware wallets.
More likely scenario is that some government agency or malicious actor infiltrate any spy from the inside.

giszmo

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WalletScrutiny.com

OP presents SEs as green/good and lack thereof as red/bad. I agree that there is certain situations where a SE can save the day but equally does the SE with their NDA-requirement and secrecy lead to a situation where we trust a black box a whole lot for being our own bank and throw "don't trust - verify" too easily over board.

Especially hardware wallets that use their SE's TRNG as sole source of entropy should be called out! Nobody can prove the TRNG to be truly random and in the worst case it just creates hash("you won't guess this", serialNumber, sequenceNumber) "random" numbers that the inventor can trivially guess. Such a hardware wallet would allow the provider to know all the private keys generated by all the users, putting him in the position of being able to pull the rug at any time.

Please add in the OP:

Is a single TRNG the sole source of entropy?
Can the used entropy be audited or does the chip that mungs together all entropy spit out a master seed without accountability?
Does the MCU trust the SE? To my understanding, BitBox02 does not entrust the SE even to hold the master seed. It only holds a symmetric key to decrypt the master seed stored outside the SE.

As you can see in my footer, I work on WalletScrutiny where my primary goal is to prevent rug pulls as I see them as a systemic risk if we get another MtGox situation where half the community is affected. Reliance on a compromised TRNG is one of my big concerns.

dkbit98

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List is updated with new and little known hardware wallet Husky HDW20 coming from Canada, that has well known secure element ATECC608A.
This same secure element is used in other hardware wallets like ColdCard Mk3, Passport and Bitbox02 previously used this same secure element before switching to new ATECC608B.
Wallet appears to be closed source, I couldn't find any github source, and all desktop and mobile applications are available on their website.
Note that I didn't test this wallet myself and I don't know anyone who owns this device, so I can't confirm if stated secure element is really in this device.

dkbit98

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News update about Secure Elements, Microchip Technology is migrating their old secure element ATECC608A to the new version ATECC608B.
ATECC608A chip is still used in some hardware wallets like ColdCard Mk3 and Passport, while Bitbox02 recently switched to new version ATECC608B.
Same chip was previously used in M5Stack Core2 ESP32 Development Kit for AWS and it's unknown if they updated it.

Differences between ATECC608A and ATECC608B:

- Low-Frequency I²C Issue fixed (that can cause data corruption and device responding incorrectly)
- Device Revision Differences (package marking on Microchip security devices does not identify the device type)
- Execution Time Differences (after implementing new security enhancements)
- Enhanced Temperature Range (extended range of -40°C to +100°C)
- New Packages (3-pin RBH contact package)

Both of this chips are nearly identical in every other way and devices should be able to replace them fairly easy, but problem is that they are hard to find on market because of chain supply and chip shortage issues.
It is still unclear if this flaws in ATECC608A could affect ColdCard or Passport wallet or if that can be somehow exploited, but manufacturer strongly recommended converting to ATECC608B to enhance overall system security.
Source document: https://ww1.microchip.com/downloads/en/Appnotes/Migrating-from-the-ATECC608A-to-the-ATECC608B-DS40002237A.pdf

n0nce

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not your keys, not your coins!

Quote from: dkbit98 on October 20, 2021, 06:43:55 AM

Quote from: n0nce on October 20, 2021, 06:27:22 AM

Unfortunately, no gerber files in the GitHub. I'm not sure how to convert the PDF into Gerber, it may be easy, it may be a pain lol.

There are some paid software for doing pdf to gerber conversion, but I think this free and open source software is also good, or you can just extract images from pdf file and convert them to gerber files:
https://swannman.github.io/pdf2gerb/

According to the documentation, it expects top, bottom and silkscreen layers. However, the BB02 PCB has two middle layers and a drill layer, so I don't think it will work unfortunately. Maybe they might send some gerber files, I'll open a GitHub issue.

dkbit98

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Quote from: n0nce on October 20, 2021, 06:27:22 AM

Unfortunately, no gerber files in the GitHub. I'm not sure how to convert the PDF into Gerber, it may be easy, it may be a pain lol.

There are some paid software for doing pdf to gerber conversion, but I think this free and open source software is also good, or you can just extract images from pdf file and convert them to gerber files:
https://swannman.github.io/pdf2gerb/

n0nce

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Quote from: dkbit98 on October 20, 2021, 06:16:22 AM

~

Unfortunately, no gerber files in the GitHub. I'm not sure how to convert the PDF into Gerber, it may be easy, it may be a pain lol.

When looking online for someone who may have done it already, I came across this:
https://www.eevblog.com/forum/blog/eevblog-1374-diy-trezor-crypto-hardware-wallet-part-1/

EEVBlog attempted the same thing with the Trezor, this should be an interesting video which I now added to my personal 'watch later' list

dkbit98

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Quote from: n0nce on October 20, 2021, 05:56:22 AM

You can order PCBs quite cheaply as well; maybe I'll order the parts and try my luck just for the heck of it Wink

Yeah I know about PCBs and it's more complicated than other parts because it needs to be custom made, other things you just need to order and solder together.
Only problem is that it may be a bit harder to find some parts because of global chip shortage, so you need to look locally as well as doing some internet search.

Quote from: n0nce on October 20, 2021, 05:56:22 AM

Just one thing that I'm not sure of is how to program the chip (have to look into it). I have all sorts of programmers here though, so it should work.

All instructions are provided on their github pug, but if something is missing I would say that it's very similar with Trezor wallet that have everything posted in more details, and maybe Bitbox devs are willing to help.
Making some DIY wallet review article may bring more attention on their Bitbox wallet.

n0nce

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Quote from: dkbit98 on October 19, 2021, 11:09:09 AM

There is total of 64 parts for BitbOx02 and total price of all parts is around $20, but you need to have some patience and soldering skills to put everything together and 3d print STL files.
Maybe most complicated part of this project would be creating a custom printed circuit board but everything is provided in schematics documents.

Ohh right, right, PCB files are available as well, of course.. this would be a pretty cool project to be honest! Cheesy

You can order PCBs quite cheaply as well; maybe I'll order the parts and try my luck just for the heck of it Wink

By the way; some services even solder the SMD stuff for you at little or no extra charge at all.

Just one thing that I'm not sure of is how to program the chip (have to look into it). I have all sorts of programmers here though, so it should work.

dkbit98

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Quote from: SFR10 on October 19, 2021, 02:54:24 PM

While I was searching for the first one on the list ^{[without a price]}, I stumbled upon an old GitHub link that said Trezor had one ^{["STM32F205VET6"]}!

STM32F205VET6 is NOT a secure element, but a main microcontroller chip that every other hardware wallet device have and it is used for general operation.
In other example from that link STM32F042K is main chip used in ledger wallet and they used second chip secure element ST31H320.
In BitBox02 main chip is ATSAMD51J20A and second chip secure element is ATECC608B, so don't mix things please.
Secure element is second chip that is usually only used for keeping a secret phrase.

SFR10

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Quote from: dkbit98 on October 19, 2021, 08:03:36 AM

I couldn't find exact price for other secured element chips used in other wallets,

While I was searching for the first one on the list ^{[without a price]}, I stumbled upon an old GitHub link that said Trezor had one ^{["STM32F205VET6"]}!
^{- AFAICR, Trezor never released a model with a secure element ^{[despite creating one for testing purposes]}, so I'm assuming that the information on that link is inaccurate. Am I right ^{[I had no luck in verifying it]}?}

Update:

Quote from: dkbit98 on October 19, 2021, 03:03:36 PM

STM32F205VET6 is NOT a secure element, but a main microcontroller chip that every other hardware wallet device have and it is used for general operation.
In other example from that link STM32F042K is main chip used in ledger wallet and they used second chip secure element ST31H320.
In BitBox02 main chip is ATSAMD51J20A and second chip secure element is ATECC608B, so don't mix things please.
Secure element is second chip that is usually only used for keeping a secret phrase.

So that's why I couldn't find anything... Thank you for the explanation part.

dkbit98

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Quote from: n0nce on October 19, 2021, 10:50:09 AM

Yup, I know about this - I never thought that I pay 100+ bucks for the secure chip, that's never been on my mind to be honest, I was always like 'I pay for the R & D' Grin

But to be honest, I would need more than 10 hours to 'clone' a BitBox, which means I'd work below minimum wage to DIY it instead of just buying it. That's why it wouldn't make so much sense in my opinion.

I am not sure if 10 hours is needed to make one, but BitBox02 first showed up in 2019 and it is based on open source Trezor hardware wallet with many hardware and software modifications,
but BitBox02 remained open source with addition of secure element.
Sure, you can purchase new Bitbox wallet today from manufacturer for €119, but you can make your own DIY Bitbox for around $20 (if you find and order all parts), because they released everything on their github page.

- List of materials you need (secure element used from 2021 is ATECC608B instead of ATECC608A.
- Circuit Board Schematics
- ATECC608B secure element (around $1)
- ATSAMD51J20A 32-bit ARM Cortex M4F microcontroller (around $6)
- PRTR5V0U2F + all other parts (around 13$)

There is total of 64 parts for BitbOx02 and total price of all parts is around $20, but you need to have some patience and soldering skills to put everything together and 3d print STL files.
Maybe most complicated part of this project would be creating a custom printed circuit board but everything is provided in schematics documents.

n0nce

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not your keys, not your coins!

Quote from: dkbit98 on October 19, 2021, 08:03:36 AM

I found one interesting thing about Secure Element microchip ATECC608A that is used in hardware wallets like Coldcard, Passport and Bitbox.
It can be fond and purchased online or in stores very easy for price of 1 usd (or less than 1 euro), and price goes even lower if you purchase it in a bulk.
Than you only need to found a schematic and make your own diy secure hardware wallet.

Yup, I know about this - I never thought that I pay 100+ bucks for the secure chip, that's never been on my mind to be honest, I was always like 'I pay for the R & D' Grin

But to be honest, I would need more than 10 hours to 'clone' a BitBox, which means I'd work below minimum wage to DIY it instead of just buying it. That's why it wouldn't make so much sense in my opinion.

However, it's good that they're readily available, so that at least in theory, you can have 'reproducible builds' of the hardware and not only the software / firmware.

dkbit98

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I found one interesting thing about Secure Element microchip ATECC608A that is used in hardware wallets like Coldcard, Passport and Bitbox.
It can be fond and purchased online or in stores very easy for price of 1 usd (or less than 1 euro), and price goes even lower if you purchase it in a bulk.
Than you only need to found a schematic and make your own diy secure hardware wallet.

One example from microchip.com website:
1-24 chips = $0.90
25-99 chips = $0.75
100-999 chips = $0.68
1000-4999 chips = $0.63
5000-9999 chips = $0.61
10000+ chips = $0.56

I couldn't find exact price for other secured element chips used in other wallets, but I doubt they cost more than a few bucks, so better think about that next time you want to spend money on some hardware wallet. Wink

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Quote from: dkbit98 on October 11, 2021, 12:33:29 PM

Quote from: Tibu on October 11, 2021, 02:09:16 AM

Hey,
First of all, I would like to thank you for this great topic. It's really important to have such an overview while considering a hardware wallet.
May I ask you to add our product ?

It's called Satochip, based on a smart card, this hardware wallet is open source and build on the NXP JCOP interface.

Sure you can, Satochip is now added to the list in first page.
I don't have plan to list every single hardware wallet that exist in the world, so it is possible that some of them are still missing.

Thank you for the quick shot Wink

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