Glossary comparison
Fault injection simulation vs Glitching: what is the difference?
The difference
Glitching is an attack that injects real faults into a chip through its supply or clock to break security. Fault injection simulation is a verification activity with modelled faults.
Fault injection simulation forces modelled faults into a design during verification to measure safety coverage. Glitching injects real faults into real silicon to break its security.
The two terms
Fault injection simulation
Verification that deliberately forces stuck-at or transient faults into an RTL or gate-level model and checks whether the safety mechanisms detect them. It supplies measured diagnostic coverage evidence rather than expert estimates.
Glitching
Fault injection by briefly violating the supply voltage or clock timing so that logic samples wrong values or the CPU mis-executes. It is one of the lowest-cost practical attacks on embedded devices and needs only modest equipment.
Side by side
| Field | Fault injection simulation | Glitching |
|---|---|---|
| Stands for | Not an abbreviation | Not an abbreviation |
| Type | Process | Term |
| Domain | Safety & Security | Safety & Security |
| Group | Safety analysis | Hardware attacks |