Novel MOSFET Operation for Detection of Recycled Integrated Circuits

Counterfeiting of integrated circuits (ICs) by recycling used components poses a recognized threat to critical systems reliability. The explosive growth of the internet of things is likely to exacerbate the problem. There is a pressing need for economical methods of finding these counterfeits. The challenge lies in differentiating between new and used components which function within specifications. A small embedded sensor which is sensitive to CMOS aging effects could be a solution. The hot carrier injection (HCI) mechanism is irreversible and is thus an interesting candidate for such a sensor. We have investigated whether HCI could be exploited so that a differential nMOSFET pair could be expected to generate a detectable signal in a used IC. Our simulations suggest that such an arrangement should be able to signal a 6-month-old 65 nm IC.