FPGA core watermarking based on power signature analysis

This paper introduces a new method to watermark FPGA cores where the signature (watermark) is detected at the power supply pins of the FPGA. This is the first watermarking method, where the signature is extracted in this way. The authors were able to sign cores at the netlist as well as the bitfile level, so a wide spectrum of cores can be protected. The power watermarking method works with all types of FPGAs, but with Xilinx FPGAs, the watermarking algorithms and the signature can be integrated into the functionality of the watermarked core. So it is very hard to remove the watermark without destroying the core. A detection algorithm was introduced which can decode the signature from a voltage trace with high probability. Additionally, a second algorithm is introduced which improves the detection probability in case of considerable noise sources. Using this algorithm, it is possible to decode the signature even if other cores operate on the same device at the same time