Secure Computer Architecture and Hardware Design

General Information

Instructor: Nader Sehatbakhsh, Assistant Professor, UCLA
TAs: TBD
Lectures: Online
Office Hours: by appointment*
Textbook: None
Links: We will use Perusall in this course. Please use the links posted in CCLE to enroll.
***Reading List: HERE.

* To schedule an appointment, send a direct message on Perusall (preferred) or an email with your name and availability to nsehat@ee.ucla.edu with subject: [209AS]Appointment

Course Description

Computer hardware, more generally Microarchitectures, are the front lines in the battle to construct secure computing systems. Securing hardware is highly critical since hardware exploits can break the assumptions underpinning numerous software security mechanisms. Unfortunately, recent high-profile attacks, such as Spectre and Meltdown, have shown that securing computer hardware is becoming much more challenging for designers and, in turn, require fundamental changes to the way hardware and microarchitecture have been designed. This course will study the cutting-edge in secure microarchitecture and hardware design by examining the interplay between hardware, software, and applied cryptography in computing systems. This course will be focused on (a) seminal studies that showed hardware vulnerabilities (attacks) and (b) effective defense mechanisms to address these vulnerabilities (defenses). The first several classes will feature lectures from the instructor: to give background on secure hardware systems from the standpoints of Computer Architecture and Applied Cryptography. The body of the course will be readings, presentations, and discussions of late-breaking (primarily last several years) papers in the field and (possibly) guest lectures from the industry. The course will feature a quarter-long original (group) research project. The course does not have a midterm or final exams, or any individual assignments.