Data Security

PolarFire FPGAs and PolarFire SoC FPGAs represent the industry's most advanced security programmable RISC-V processor-based devices. Data security protects application data—stored, communicated, or computed at run-time—from being copied, altered, or corrupted. PolarFire FPGA and PolarFire SoC FPGA “S” devices have a dedicated Cryptoprocessor, referred as User Cryptoprocessor, for data security applications.

In PolarFire FPGA, the User Cryptoprocessor is a standalone block, which is accessible to a soft processor in the FPGA fabric.

In PolarFire SoC FPGA, the User Cryptoprocessor is integrated within the MSS. For information about MSS, see PolarFire SoC FPGA MSS Technical Reference Manual. The User Cryptoprocessor can be accessed from MSS or Fabric. The default configuration after power-up is defined by the Libero configuration. In PolarFire SoC FPGAs, the User Cryptoprocessor can be configured to operate in following modes using the flash bits set by MSS configurator in the Libero:

Table 1. PolarFire SoC FPGA User Cryptoprocessor Modes
Mode Crypto Ownership Mode Flash Bits Description
Reset 0xx The Cryptoprocessor is not available to the MSS or Fabric and is held in reset
MSS 100 The Cryptoprocessor is only available to the MSS
Fabric 101 The Cryptoprocessor is only available to the Fabric
Shared-MSS 110 The Cryptoprocessor is initially connected to the MSS, and may be requested by the Fabric
Shared-Fabric 111 The Cryptoprocessor is initially connected to the Fabric, and may be requested by the MSS

For more information about MSS configurator, see PolarFire SoC Standalone MSS Configurator User Guide.

Figure 1. PolarFire SoC FPGA User Cryptoprocessor Interfaces Block Diagram