Making Computing More Secure

Have you been attacked by a computer virus/worm or hacker in the last week? Well, if you're like most of us, then the answer will be a resounding "yes", and if not, you'll probably have heard of someone who has.

Almost every day we read another article about someone having their personal and banking data stolen and fraudulently re-used. We hear about company laptops with all of our confidential information, even our national identity details, being stolen. And this can make us feel very nervous about storing and exchanging confidential data on our notebooks and PCs. Until early 2003, attempts to solve this threat meant the installation of a number of security applications on our PC that inadvertently sucked away all of our system resources, grinding down the computer's usability.

VIA pioneered a new, pro-active approach to security of data back in early 2003 called the VIA PadLock Security Initiative that differed from software-only solutions, by adopting a holistic hardware/software approach to data protection.

Introduced into all recent VIA processor cores was a powerful set of security tools called the VIA PadLock Security Engine which, when integrated into applications, allowed developers to offset to the security engine many of the computational processes involved in the protection of information exchanged and stored, enabling applications to implement real-time military-grade security without draining system resources. Initially including a powerful quantum based random number generator providing an unshakable foundation for security, the Engine expanded the tools offered to developers to include the world's fastest x86 AES cryptography engine. With the release of the VIA C7 processor family, the VIA PadLock Security Engine has extended the protection offered to now include the world's most comprehensive set of x86 based security tools.

VIA then provided an easy to use software development kit to make it simple for developers to add VIA PadLock Security Engine code into their applications, and a series of VIA PadLock-enabled software that protected laptop and PC user information in real-time.

To learn more about the VIA PadLock Security Initiative click here.

VIA PadLock Protects in the Real-World

The development of a holistic hardware/software solution to help combat security threats sounds all well and good, but how does VIA PadLock work in the real world?

Ever wondered how hackers crack the security keys used to safely exchange data in online banking and e-trading? Well in a number of ways, but mainly, hackers use a technique that assumes security keys are generated using random numbers that are not really random. Confused? Well most security software today creates random numbers by measuring the inherit randomness in the way we use the keyboard and mouse. However, what hackers have discovered is that our movements are actually quite predictable, and this predictability creates patterns, that hackers can then use to thwart an application's security key. VIA PadLock helps combat this threat.

Making Online Transactions Safer

The new VIA JCP is an add-on package to the Java Runtime Environment that offloads the random number generation and AES cipher process used by most online and desktop Java applications such as online banking and e-trading, which would normally use security keys generated by the Java Cryptography Architecture. With VIA PadLock enabled, they instead harness the power and speed of the VIA PadLock quantum-based random number generators, which produce truly random numbers by harvesting the interaction of sub-atomic particles. This prevents hackers from exploiting the predictability of software-based "pseudo" RNGs, and in turn increases the strength of protection offered by Java based online banking, e-trading and other security applications. To learn more about VIA JCP click here.

Mobile Security

Ever had your laptop stolen or caught someone using your computer during your lunch break, and then worried about the important documents that could have been compromised? Well, VIA StrongBox has the answer. Using the real-time AES encryption engine into all recent VIA processors, this application creates secure virtual drives or "strongboxes" on your system. Each virtual drive can be of any size, will store any type of document, photo, or file (even your email), and is made secure at the click of the mouse, using a combination of VIA PadLock-enabled AES 256-bit encryption and SHA-1 secure hash. To put that level of security into perspective, it would take today's supercomputers 149,000,000,000 years to thwart the 256-bit algorithm alone. Click here to learn more about VIA StrongBox.

There's also a short movie taking a lighter look at mobile security and VIA PadLock defending your data! Download the video here.

Simple and Easy to Integrate into Applications

At VIA, we adopted an open-standards approach to security. All security software developed to harness the power of VIA PadLock is available for free download here, and VIA even developed an easy to use software development kit for developers to easily integrate and utilize the power of the VIA PadLock feature set. Comprising of a programming guide, source code for both Microsoft® Windows® and Linux, and numerous sample programs for reference purposes, the VIA PadLock SDK also acts as a source for pieces of code that developers can directly copy into other programs. Click here to learn more about the VIA PadLock SDK.

What's inside VIA PadLock?

Introduced first into the VIA C3 processors based on the VIA C5XL core, the VIA PadLock Security Engine initially comprised a quantum-based random number generator, and then went onto to include a real-time AES encryption engine. With the release of the VIA C7 processor family, the VIA PadLock Security Engine extended the protection offered to include the world's most comprehensive set of x86 based security tools that includes:

• The world's fastest x86 AES cipher engine that performs sustained encryption of data at a rate of 22 Gbps
  
• A powerful secure hash engine that performs SHA-1/SHA-256 hashing at a rate of up to 10.4 millions calculations per second
  
• A Montgomery Multiplier to accelerate the all types of public key encryption such as RSA to a rate of up to 900 signings per second
  
• NX Execute Protection to prevent the propagation of worms
  
• Dual quantum based random number generators that generate truly random numbers at rates of up to 12 million per second making it difficult for hackers to reverse engineer the keys used to securely exchange data

To learn more about the different security features offered in the range of VIA Processors click here.