How to Protect Your IC Chips from Counterfeiting

Image source Freepik

Are you a semiconductor chip manufacturer? One of the worst nightmares that you will face is counterfeiting. As much as you may be committed to producing quality semiconductor chips for your business, there could be another business entity that is producing similar products.  For many years, counterfeiting has been a serious problem that has been affecting the electronic component industry.  IC chips are among the top electronic components that are affected by counterfeiting.

IC chip counterfeiting comes with a broad array of negative impacts that will affect your business in different ways. The good news is it is a problem that you can deal with. In this article, we are going to cover methods that you can deploy to protect your semiconductor chips from counterfeiting.

Types of counterfeit chips

 Before we even look at the solutions to IC chip counterfeits, it will be prudent to cover the main types of fake chips. They include the following:

· Gray market recycled semiconductor chips: Basically, these are recycled IC chips. They are made from collecting parts and components of old chips.  The final product will look like the original chip. Makers of recycled chips may even include the labels of the original manufacturers to hoodwink the buyers.

· Cloned IC chips: Also known as fraudulent chips, they are physically, visually, and to some extent structurally similar to the original chips. They mimic the original chips in most aspects.  However, they may have some serious security and even operational flaws that separate them from the original chips.

· Surplus and failed components:   Some manufacturers prefer to discard damaged electronic components back to the supply chain. This is quite common especially when the components fail some tests. Rogue manufacturers may reuse the failed components to assemble complete semiconductor chips.

Measures to protect your chips from being cloned

Now let’s look at some of the most effective techniques that you can use to protect your semiconductor chips from being cloned:

Embedding optical patterns on semiconductor chips

This anti-counterfeiting measure is implemented during the chip manufacturing process.  It entails embedding a unique optical pattern on the semiconductor chip. Since they are visual patterns, it means that the buyers of the semiconductor chips can visually recognize them. There are special optical inspection technologies that are used for identifying and recognizing these patterns. Buyers may use scanners and special cameras to identify the patterns.

One thing about optical patterns is they have unique designs. As a chip manufacturer, you should develop a design that cannot be easily copied. Some optical patterns come with tamper-evident properties. These are features that give visual proof an item has been tampered with.

At the very basic level, you can use optical patterns for branding your semiconductor chips. Make the pattern unique such that it cannot be easily cloned by malicious players in the industry.

Using electrical watermarks

This is one of the most effective anti-counterfeiting measures that you can use to protect your IC chips from being cloned. Also known as digital watermarks, they have unique features that identify the original manufacturer of the IC chips.  An electrical watermark should be unique and hard to create. It should also provide a direct link to the creator of the integrated circuit. This means that whenever someone sees the watermark, they should be able to tell that it belongs to a particular brand.

 How do I create electrical watermarks for my IC chips? This is done at the design stage of the IC fabrication process. You simply need to create unique patterns in the arrangement of electric components in a circuit. The identifier will be completely different from other circuits and watermarks in the market. For example, you can change the geometry of the transistors and the interconnection between the electronic components in a circuit. Like optical patterns, watermarks are also identified using special technologies and tools.

Embedded security features

This technique entails embedding integrated circuits with different security features.  The method is also known as using chip-level security. There are several ways of implementing this method.  The most common technique is using an embedded cryptographic identity feature.  You will include unique encrypted data that has details of the manufacturer. A buyer will be able to decrypt the information after buying the chip. It may be quite hectic for the manufacturers of fake IC chips to reproduce similar cryptographic codes.

Anti-counterfeit IC chip packaging

You should deploy packaging techniques that will secure your IC chips from being cloned. The easiest method is marking IC packages with unique chemical dyes that are hard to reproduce. You may use identifiers and microscopic patterns that won't be copied with ease.  Including unique serial codes on your  IC packaging can also wade off the counterfeiters. Some manufacturers use tamper-proof seals to ensure that the packaging is not interfered with   in the supply chain.  In such cases, buyers are usually warned from buying the chip in case the seal has been tampered with.

Chip traceability

What happens after you are done with the manufacturing of semiconductor chips?  One of the anti-counterfeiting steps is to trace the movement of semiconductor chips in the supply chain. You can use special serial numbers to implement the traceability of your  IC chips. With this method, it will be easy to tell where the product is and in case of any tampering, you will be in a position to pinpoint the person that has done it.

Collaborating with the relevant agencies

Even as you focus on implementing these anti-counterfeit measures, you should take things to a higher level by working with various anti-counterfeit agencies. Some of these organizations operate globally while others are local-based. Take your time to know all these agencies and find ways of working with them to secure your chips. You should also implement various practices and measures as recommended by these organizations.

Consumer education

Even after implementing all these methods, your efforts may be fruitless if you don’t educate target buyers about the presence of counterfeit chips in the market. Furthermore, you should enlighten them of the measures that you have taken to deal with this problem.

Most of the solutions that we have discussed require strong partnerships between buyers and manufacturers. For example, you can inform them of where to buy semiconductor chips. It would help if you also chose trusted suppliers whom you can direct your customers to. This is in addition to other verification and security measures that prove the originality of IC chips. Consumer education is one thing that you should do regularly.

The future of counterfeit chips

In as much as the demand for electronic and technological products keeps going up, we should expect equal growth of counterfeit chips. There is a high chance that the counterfeits will keep up with the pace of original chip production. This is likely to happen despite the advanced chip manufacturing methods that different IC manufacturers are using. However, it is easier it is easier to reverse-engineer older manufacturing methods. This implies that if you are using old techniques to develop semiconductor chips, there is a high chance that you will be an easy target for IC chip counterfeiting.

Most producers of fake IC chips are in it for financial gain. They target IC chips that are in high demand as this will guarantee quick returns. Chips used in making popular consumer electronic devices are usually targeted. Additionally, counterfeiting also attracts chips that have the highest profit margins. Specialized IC chips for niche markets such as security and IoT are prone to counterfeiting.

Companies need to regularly update their chip anti-counterfeiting measures so that they can secure their products from being cloned. These measures should cover from the chip design process to the supply chain. The good news is thanks to technological advancements, better security mechanisms are being developed to deal with IC chip counterfeiting. Powerful and effective tools are embedded in semiconductor chips to help customers identify and separate the original chips from the clones. While the road to completely securing IC chips from counterfeits may not be smooth, we are certainly heading somewhere.

Conclusion

Whether you are an IC chip manufacturer or your business entails the use of semiconductor chips, the last thing that you would want to deal with is counterfeit. We have already looked at ways in which counterfeiting can hurt your chip manufacturing business.  On the other hand, it also has a devastating impact on the device makers.

The best way of dealing with this problem is by using various measures that we have discussed here.  Even though the solutions may not be 100% effective, they will still have some significant impact on your business. One of the measures that we have mentioned is working with an authorized semiconductor chip distributor. This solution works perfectly whether you are a manufacturer or buyer.

At Rantle East Electronic, we are fully committed to eradicating the IC counterfeiting menace.  We source our semiconductor chips directly from the best manufacturers around the world. You can be sure of getting genuine semiconductor chips for your business. We have also implemented v many other steps that ensure all our products are not counterfeits.