Intel Total Memory Encryption: Functional Verification and Performance Analysis

While more attention is generally focused on software security, computer hardware security remains an important effort. Should an attacker gain direct physical access, computers with little to no hardware security can quickly be compromised via a manner of methods. One such attacker method is to steal information directly from the active memory of a locked, powered-on computer. To counter this attack, a hardware security method was developed called memory encryption. Memory encryption, as the name suggests, protects against adversary methods like cold boot attacks by encrypting all of memory. This research evaluates the efficacy and performance specifically of Intel TME. To validate functionality, this research conducts several test cases using a warm boot attack to confirm whether TME is fully encrypting all of memory when under different conditions. Also provided is a statistical comparison of system performance with and without TME enabled. Finally, for organizational users interested in adopting this security technology, several recommendations are presented on how to securely implement TME.