"New Chip Hides Wireless Messages in Plain Sight"

Researchers at Princeton University have developed a method that incorporates security into the physical nature of wireless transmissions to prevent eavesdropping. Encryption methods currently used to protect communications from eavesdroppers can be difficult to scale toward high-speed and ultra-low-latency systems for 5G and beyond because the nature of encryption requires information to be exchanged between the sender and receiver to encrypt and decrypt a message. This exchange increases the vulnerability of the link to attacks. In addition, it requires computing that increases latency, which is the amount of time spent between sending instructions on a network and data arrival. Latency is an essential measure for tasks such as autonomous driving and industrial automation. Lessening time to action is critical for networks supporting self-driving cars, robots, and other latency-critical cyber-physical systems. The new millimeter-wave wireless microchip developed by the team enables wireless transmissions to prevent interception without reducing the 5G network's latency, efficiency, and speed. As a result, the technique will make it hard for malicious actors to eavesdrop on high-frequency wireless transmissions, even if there are multiple colluding actors. The method shapes the transmission itself instead of depending on encryption to thwart eavesdroppers. An attempt to intercept the message by interfering with the main transmission would cause problems in the transmission and be detectable by the intended user. In theory, it is possible for multiple eavesdroppers to work together to collect noise-like signals and try reassembling them into an understandable transmission, but the number of receivers needed to do that would be extraordinarily large, according to the researchers. This article continues to discuss the new chip developed by the Princeton researchers to foil would-be eavesdroppers.

Princeton University reports "New Chip Hides Wireless Messages in Plain Sight"