YAST Is a Security Development Platform for Smart Card-Like Applications

Michael Grand has designed a security token around NXP's LPC55Sxx chip and SE050 secure element.

Abhishek Jadhav
3 years agoSecurity

In today's world, security tokens are essential for keeping restricted resources safe from unauthorized access. Security expert Michael Grand has designed a security token, a development platform for smart card-like applications — the YAST (Yet Another Security Token).

Grand's open source security token is built around NXP's LPC55Sxx chip and an SE050 secure element that offers enhanced Common Criteria EAL 6+-based security. The LPC55Sxx chip is an Arm Cortex M33-based microcontroller that supports real-time encryption and decryption using the PRINCE encryption engine.

The YAST security token shares the same form factor as Google's OpenSK security key project, meaning its case can be repurposed. Note, however, that the YAST can be used as a development board and not as a daily security token. You can also build this token yourself using KiCad with all the design files available in the GitHub repository.

"You will need a PCB with a thickness of at least 2.0mm (best 2.4mm). You can also use a small piece of tape to improve the thickness of your PCB," Grand explains. Since the CMS is no smaller than 0603, placing the components is not hard. However, the regulator, SE050, and LPC55 are difficult for placement.

A six-pin header is provided through the LPC55 SWD port along with a USB port. The NXP's LPC-Link2 can be employed as a debugging probe, while the USB port can also be used to configure the LPC55 chip via the on-chip bootloader. More details on the steps for programming and debugging are available in the project logs on Grand's project page.

Abhishek Jadhav
Abhishek Jadhav is an engineering student, freelance tech writer, RISC-V Ambassador, and leader of the Open Hardware Developer Community.
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