Posted on 11/21/2012 10:39:54 AM PST by ExxonPatrolUs
A new anti-counterfeiting requirement from the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) at Fort Belvoir, Va., is triggering pushback from semiconductor manufacturers, who claim the new requirement is not an appropriate cure for electronics counterfeiting, does not authenticate legacy semiconductors, has not been tested adequately, and will increase semiconductor manufacturing costs.
The DNA-marking mandate, which became effective on 15 November requires all semiconductors sold to the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) to be marked with DNA-based materials unique to each government contractor.
The intent is to prevent counterfeit parts from entering the DOD supply chain by authenticating each piece with a unique DNA-based signature. Using DNA is intended to provide a fool-proof fingerprint for each semiconductor the DOD buys to rule out the possibility of counterfeiting.
(Excerpt) Read more at militaryaerospace.com ...
Yes, and the Chinese manufacturers of the DNA markers will be very careful to make sure all of the production goes to the intended US semiconductor manufacturers...
It’s not that hard to copy DNA. So it’s not clear how a DNA fingerprint would prevent counterfeiting.
The DNA mark is a hash of several thousand DNA strands, ONE of which is the authenticator, which is determined by a polymerase chain reaction analysis that is very specific to the target DNA and blind to the others. You could possibly include two targets.
A counterfeiter can indeed retrieve all the DNA strands, but would have to copy all of them, the chaff and the target, to succeed. They would not know which is the target strand. This would take quite a while.
The US supplier, though, just needs to add a known strand to the existing hash.
They use this technology in the UK in the dye packs that banks slip to robbers. Each dye mark can be traced to a specific bank.
That's the kind of regulation that is a bureaucrat's wet dream.
Thanks.
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