Electronic Component Fingerprinting to Determine Manufacturing Origin

ClearMark Systems has developed a sensitive and non-destructive inspection technology for identifying the point of origin of semiconductor chips.We capture the identifying information by analyzing markings on the silicon die or the chip package made by laser marking tools at the fabrication facility.Our Phase I effort has successfully distinguished markings that were made by a target tool versus similar challenge tools with very low false positive and false negative rates even when a challenge tool was controlled by an expert instructed to defeat our methodology.In our Phase II effort, the core technology will be expanded to improve the detectable feature resolution, increase the number of the feature-space dimensions used by the classifier, and improve computational efficiency.The entire process flow will be scripted and integrated in order to support automated application in the field.The outcome of the Phase II effort will be a comprehensive platform for the analysis of die serializations, package and wafer markings, and other identifiable markings on parts.The platform will enable in situ verification of the provenance of integrated circuits as well as more detailed comparisons against a database of fingerprints for the purpose of positively identifying specific tools of origin.