Introducing wolfSentry
wolfSSL has a major new product in development — wolfSentry, the universal, dynamic, embeddable IDPS (intrusion detection and prevention system). At a high level, wolfSentry is a dynamically configurable logic hub, arbitrarily associating user-defined events with user-defined actions, contextualized by connection attributes, tracking the evolution of the client-server relationship. At a low level, wolfSentry is a firewall engine (both static and fully dynamic), with O(log n) lookup of known hosts/netblocks.
wolfSentry will be fully integrated into wolfSSL, wolfMQTT, and wolfSSH, with optional in-tree call-ins and callbacks that give application developers turnkey IDPS across all network-facing wolfSSL products, with a viable zero-configuration option. These integrations will be available via simple --enable-wolfidps configure options in wolfSSL sibling products.
The wolfSentry engine will be dynamically configurable programmatically through an API, or from a textual input file supplied to the engine. Callback and client-server implementations will also be supplied that deliver advanced capabilities including remote logging through MQTT or syslog, and remote configuration and status queries, all cryptographically secured.
Notably, wolfSentry is designed from the ground up to function well in resource-constrained, bare-metal, and realtime environments, with algorithms to stay within designated maximum memory footprints and maintain deterministic throughput. wolfSentry with dynamic firewalling can add as little as 64k to the code footprint, and 32k to the volatile state footprint, and can fully leverage the existing logic and state of applications and sibling libraries.
The first beta release of wolfSentry is planned for April 2021, with turnkey product integrations to follow.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
Are you using an Off Brand TLS?
It is not always easy to tell if your TLS vendor is legitimate. They might have great slide decks, a list of supported ciphers, and a smooth talking salesperson, but do they have what it takes to keep you secure? Here’s how you tell: Ask them if they do fuzz testing. If you get a blank stare, it is time to move on. If they mumble a yes, then you should ask them about their overall testing infrastructure. If it doesn’t look like this: https://www.wolfssl.com/overview-of-testing-in-wolfssl/, then you might want to reconsider that vendor.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
I-CUBE-WOLFSSL is MadeForSTM32 Certified
wolfSSL software expansion package for STM32Cube is among the first to be MadeForSTM32 certified with V2 label! Having gone through the evaluation process, we’re pleased to announce that I-CUBE-WOLFSSL V4.6.0 is granted MadeForSTM32 V2, a new quality label introduced by STMicroelectronics for the STM32 microcontrollers ecosystem.
wolfSSL offers support for STM32Cube Expansion Package enhanced for STM32 toolset, adding on to previous support for the STM32 Standard Peripheral Library as well as the STM32Cube HAL (Hardware Abstraction Layer). We’re making it easy for users to pull wolfSSL directly into STM32CubeMX and STM32CubeIDE projects.
Check out our product page for more information on the package. If you missed the webinar, watch the recording and demo here to learn how to use wolfSSL software expansion for STM32Cube.
wolfSSL focuses on providing lightweight and embedded security solutions with an emphasis on speed, size, portability, features, and standards compliance. With its SSL/TLS products and crypto library, wolfSSL is supporting high security designs in automotive, avionics and other industries. In avionics, wolfSSL supports complete RTCA DO-178C level A certification. In automotive, we support MISRA-C capabilities. For government consumers, wolfSSL has a strong history in FIPS 140-2, with upcoming FIPS 140-3. wolfSSL supports industry standards up to the current TLS 1.3 and DTLS 1.2, is up to 20 times smaller than OpenSSL, offers a simple API, an OpenSSL compatibility layer, is backed by the robust wolfCrypt cryptography library, 24×7 support and much more. Our products are open source, giving customers the freedom to look under the hood.
Get the latest version of wolfSSL 4.7.0 from our download page!
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
Follow wolfSSL on Twitter: @wolfSSL
Follow ST: @ST_World
Xilinx “Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC’s” Benchmarking with wolfSSL
Benchmark values of the wolfSSL embedded SSL/TLS library running on Xilinx boards, including the ZCU102, have been collected and are up for viewing. Our friends over at Xilinx have a white paper posted that goes into detail about the benchmark values here: https://www.xilinx.com/support/documentation/white_papers/wp512-accel-crypto.pdf. This shows how much faster applications can perform secure operations when incorporating the hardware acceleration available on Xilinx devices. It also gives a demonstration of the performance trade-offs when choosing FreeRTOS versus an embedded Linux OS.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
Embedded Bootloader with hardware acceleration and cryptography
Most bootloaders do not use hardware acceleration and cryptography.
wolfSSL’s wolfBoot is an exception.
wolfBoot can use Secure Elements, such as ATECC508A. Thanks to integration with wolfTPM, wolfBoot can also leverage TPM 2.0, such as STMicroelectronics ST33, Infineon SLB9670, Nuvoton NPC750 and other TPM modules.
Thanks to wolfSSL’s cryptographic engine, wolfBoot can take advantage of the hardware acceleration for cryptography operations of many embedded and server platforms. Here are highlights of our platforms support list:
| Manufacture Vendor | Platform |
| STMicroelectronics | STM32F1 / F2 / F4 / L1 / WB / F7 / H7
STM32L5 (with Trustzone support) |
| NXP | Kinetis K50 / K60 / K70 / K80 |
| NXP | RT 1060 with DCP support, and LPC54xxx |
| NXP | iMX6 iMX7 iMX8 with CCAM support |
| Microchip | PIC32, MX and MZ series |
| Microchip (Atmel) | SAM R21 |
| Cypress | PSoC6 |
| Texas Instruments | TM4C1294 (ARM Cortex-M4F) |
| SiFive (RISC-V) | FE310 / HiFive1 |
| Marvell (CAVIUM) | NITROX V, NITROX III |
| XILINX | Zynq UltraScale+ |
| Intel and AMD x86 | AES-NI, AVX1 / AVX2, RDRAND / RDSEED |
wolfBoot is a solution for firmware update and authentication that can take advantage of your platform’s hardware acceleration and cryptography. This way we achieve a small memory footprint and high performance during secure updates over the air(OTA).
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
wolfCrypt FIPS 140-3 status update!
Hi! We continue to make progress on our upcoming FIPS 140-3 certification. We have now completed code review, and are working with our lab on operational testing. The process will be in NIST’s hands after that. Our goal is to be the first software cryptographic library with a FIPS 140-3 certification, and that looks like it is on track!
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
For more information on wolfCrypt’s previous 140-2 certificates, visit our FIPS page here.
Leveraging Virtual Memory in the Linux Kernel
In wolfSSL release 4.7, the Linux kernel module implementation has been enhanced to use kvmalloc() and kvfree() for heap-based storage. The typical approach using kmalloc() allocates physically contiguous memory, with meaningful limitations on the maximum size of allocation and the impact of those allocations on other system components. kvmalloc(), by contrast, uses vmalloc() internally to make non-contiguous use of memory for large allocations, which is more efficient and less contentious. The wolfSSL kernel module now leverages this capability when targeted to Linux kernel 4.12 or newer, relaxing potential resource constraints and minimizing the likelihood of interference in the kernel.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
Reproducible Builds for Confident Testing and Release Engineering
wolfSSL release 4.7 includes --enable-reproducible-build, a new configuration option that suppresses the binary jitter (timestamps and other non-functional metadata) that is otherwise common in various build processes. With --enable-reproducible-build, test and release engineers can carefully align build environments, then generate bitwise-identical binary packages with identical hashes. Using --enable-reproducible-build, FOSS binary distributors can publish their build environment attributes and parameters, then third parties can verify binary distributions by replicating the build process and comparing hashes. Similar processes can be used internal to an organization to confirm the integrity of build environments and source archives.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
wolfBoot support for ARM TrustZone
Since version 1.7.1, wolfBoot provides support for secure boot on systems with a Trusted Execution Environment (TEE).
wolfBoot provides embedded developers with a code base that complies with the specification for the separation between secure and non-secure world, on those CPUs and microcontrollers that support it. On ARMv8 Cortex-A CPU and Cortex-M microcontrollers it is now possible to create a hardware-enforced separation between the two worlds, using the ARM TrustZone technology.
Our first reference implementation has been made in collaboration with ST using STM32L5 target. This device can be configured to keep the running application or operating system from accessing the Secure world resources, including the partition containing the bootloader itself on the FLASH memory, and other hardware resources that may be configured as secure at boot time.
For more information, check out the wolfBoot product page.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.
wolfSSL Expands Compatibility Layer for OpenSSL Applications
The wolfSSL OpenSSL compatibility layer is a means to switch applications designed for OpenSSL over to use wolfSSL. In addition to this, it is constantly expanded and currently has more than 500 commonly used OpenSSL functions. wolfSSL also provides Crypto API support to enable easier migration of projects.
We recently added some more in our wolfSSL 4.7.0 release!
- SSL_get_verify_mode
- X509_VERIFY_PARAM API
- X509_STORE_CTX API
… to name a few.
Why might one want to make the migration from OpenSSL and turn on this compatibility in the first place? To start, wolfSSL has numerous benefits over its counterpart, OpenSSL. Some of these include hardware acceleration implementations, progressive adoptions of TLS 1.3 as well as a reduced footprint size. In addition to this, there is the potential to use wolfCrypt FIPS. wolfSSL maintains current FIPS 140-2 (and soon to be 140-3) support which is used in numerous applications. We also provide FIPS Ready builds to help get projects ready for FIPS verification. All of this is supported by a team of trained wolfSSL engineers.
If you have any questions or run into any issues, contact us at facts@wolfssl.com, or call us at +1 425 245 8247.