Implementation of a New RFID Authentication Protocol for EPC Gen2 Standard

Researchers have revealed that electronic product code (EPC) Gen2 standard, which is designed for passive ultrahigh-frequency radio frequency identification has various security problems. To solve these problems, some authors have proposed many lightweight protocols to enhance security. However, it is still unclear about the feasibility of such protocols, since the hardware implementation of such protocols has long been neglected. Besides, it is extremely challengeable to achieve the balance among security, low power, and low cost. In this paper, a new lightweight mutual authentication protocol based on variable linear feedback shift registers is proposed, and its security analysis is described. An ASIC implementation of the new protocol compliant with the EPC Gen2 standard is presented as well. Several low-power techniques are used to obtain the goal of low-power consumption. The implementation result shows that the area of the baseband is 0.16 mm² and power consumption is 5.5 μW. As far as we know, this is the first ASIC implementation of a lightweight protocol compliant to EPC Gen2 standard. We believe that this design will bring a novel insight to future implementations for EPC Gen2v2 standard, which is ratified recently.