Medium severity · published Oct 3, 2019
CVE-2019-15809
Smart cards from the Athena SCS manufacturer, based on the Atmel Toolbox 00.03.11.05 and the AT90SC chip, contain a timing side channel in ECDSA signature generation
4.7
CVSS
0.5%
EPSS
No
On KEV
Description
Smart cards from the Athena SCS manufacturer, based on the Atmel Toolbox 00.03.11.05 and the AT90SC chip, contain a timing side channel in ECDSA signature generation. This allows a local attacker, able to measure the duration of hundreds to thousands of signing operations, to compute the private key used. The issue occurs because the Atmel Toolbox 00.03.11.05 contains two versions of ECDSA signature functions, described as fast and secure, but the affected cards chose to use the fast version, which leaks the bit length of the random nonce via timing. This affects Athena IDProtect 010b.0352.0005, Athena IDProtect 010e.1245.0002, Athena IDProtect 0106.0130.0401, Athena IDProtect 010e.1245.0002, Valid S/A IDflex V 010b.0352.0005, SafeNet eToken 4300 010e.1245.0002, TecSec Armored Card 010e.0264.0001, and TecSec Armored Card 108.0264.0001.
CVSS vector
CVSS:3.1/AV:L/AC:H/PR:L/UI:N/S:U/C:H/I:N/A:N
Attack vector
Local
Complexity
High
Privileges
Low
User interaction
None
Confidentiality
High
Integrity
None
Availability
None
Scope
Unchanged
Exploitation
Is it being used?
Exploit prediction (EPSS)0.5% · higher than 41% of CVEs
Exploited in the wildNo evidence yet
CISA KEVNot listed
Ransomware campaign useNot known
Affected products
Which versions
AC
Armored Card · Tecsec
010e.0264.0001; 108.0264.0001 · source: NVD
AT
Atmel Toolbox · Microchip
00.03.11.05 · source: NVD
E4
Etoken 4300 · Thalesgroup
010e.1245.0002 · source: NVD
ID
Idprotect · Athena-scs
010b.0352.0005; 010e.1245.0002; 0106.0130.0401 · source: NVD
SI
S/a Idflex V · Cryptsoft
010b.0352.0005 · source: NVD
References
NVD
https://nvd.nist.gov/vuln/detail/CVE-2019-15809
CVE.org
https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2019-15809
Mailing List
http://www.openwall.com/lists/oss-security/2019/10/02/2
Third Party Advisory
https://csrc.nist.gov/Projects/Cryptographic-Algorithm-Validation-Program/details?source=ECDSA&number=214
Technical Description
https://eprint.iacr.org/2011/232.pdf
Exploit
https://minerva.crocs.fi.muni.cz/
Technical Description
https://tches.iacr.org/index.php/TCHES/article/view/7337
Product
https://www.ssi.gouv.fr/certification_cc/bibliotheque-cryptographique-atmel-toolbox-00-03-11-05/