Fault injection attacks against mobile devices use disruptive signals or events (e.g. electromagnetic pulses, laser pulses, clock glitches, etc.) to cause faulty behavior. When performed in a controlled manner on devices performing cryptographic operations, this faulty behavior can be exploited to derive secret key information. Although this attack usually requires physical control of the mobile device, it is non-destructive, and the device can be used after the attack without any indication that secret keys were compromised.
Relationships
The table below shows the other attack patterns and high level categories that are related to this attack pattern. These relationships are defined as ChildOf and ParentOf, and give insight to similar items that may exist at higher and lower levels of abstraction. In addition, relationships such as CanFollow, PeerOf, and CanAlsoBe are defined to show similar attack patterns that the user may want to explore.
Nature
Type
ID
Name
ChildOf
Meta Attack Pattern - A meta level attack pattern in CAPEC is a decidedly abstract characterization of a specific methodology or technique used in an attack. A meta attack pattern is often void of a specific technology or implementation and is meant to provide an understanding of a high level approach. A meta level attack pattern is a generalization of related group of standard level attack patterns. Meta level attack patterns are particularly useful for architecture and design level threat modeling exercises.
Adversaries require non-trivial technical skills to create and implement fault injection attacks on mobile devices. Although this style of attack has become easier (commercial equipment and training classes are available to perform these attacks), they usual require significant setup and experimentation time during which physical access to the device is required. This prerequisite makes the attack challenging to perform (assuming that physical security countermeasures and monitoring are in place).
Consequences
The table below specifies different individual consequences associated with the attack pattern. The Scope identifies the security property that is violated, while the Impact describes the negative technical impact that arises if an adversary succeeds in their attack. The Likelihood provides information about how likely the specific consequence is expected to be seen relative to the other consequences in the list. For example, there may be high likelihood that a pattern will be used to achieve a certain impact, but a low likelihood that it will be exploited to achieve a different impact.
Scope
Impact
Likelihood
Confidentiality
Access Control
Read Data
Mitigations
Strong physical security of all devices that contain secret key information. (even when devices are not in use)
Frequent changes to secret keys and certificates.
Content History
Submissions
Submission Date
Submitter
Organization
2015-11-09
CAPEC Content Team
The MITRE Corporation
Modifications
Modification Date
Modifier
Organization
2018-07-31
CAPEC Content Team
The MITRE Corporation
Updated Attack_Motivation-Consequences
2019-09-30
CAPEC Content Team
The MITRE Corporation
Updated @Abstraction
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Page Last Updated or Reviewed:
September 30, 2019
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Description
Content History
