Revisiting Logic Locking for Reversible Computing

Analogous to CMOS circuits, we can expect attacks such as integrated circuit (IC) counterfeiting, piracy through reverse engineering (RE) or over-production, and insertion of hardware Trojans to be launched on emerging class of reversible circuits, which is a promising alternative to standard CMOS technology. In this paper, we explore the possibility of securing reversible circuits against IP piracy and RE attacks using state-of-the-art logic locking techniques. Our security analysis reveals that applying existing techniques as is on reversible circuits creates new vulnerabilities due to inherent reversible properties. We propose low overhead (around 0.013x for gate count, 0.0004x for T-count and 0.02x for quantum cost on average) defense strategies that overcome these vulnerabilities and protect the circuits from all known attacks.