US 6397241

Patent Overview — US 6,397,241 B1

Title: Multiplier cell and method of computing

Patent number: US6397241B1

Application number: US09/215,935

Inventors: Philipp Michael Glaser; Michael J. Torla

Original assignee: Motorola, Inc. Current assignee listed as NXP USA Inc (the source notes listed assignees may be inaccurate).

Key dates: Priority/filing date 1998-12-18; granted/publication date 2002-05-28; anticipated expiration 2018-12-18. Legal status listed as "Expired - Fee Related."

Purpose: The patent relates to public-key cryptography and, more particularly, to a public-key cryptographic integrated circuit. RSA (Rivest-Shamir-Adleman) and ECC (Elliptic Curve Cryptography) are described as public-key algorithms providing high security for digital data transfers between electronic devices. The source states that RSA and ECC (Fp) modular mathematics can be computed on a hardware multiplier, while ECC (F2M in polynomial-basis) polynomial mathematics can be computed on a different hardware multiplier. The integrated cryptographic circuit is said to provide a hardware architecture that efficiently computes both the RSA and ECC algorithms, with applications including internet commerce, paging, cellular phones, smartcards, and smartcard terminals. Data such as personal health records, financial records, fingerprints, and retina eye prints is encrypted using functions including integer modular multiplications, modular polynomial multiplication, addition, subtraction, and exponentiation.

Plain-language scope: The disclosure describes an integrated cryptographic circuit supporting both RSA and ECC algorithms, pipelined multiplier architectures for parallel computations, and specific multiplier cells. Figure listings include a 1×N multiplier for computing either the RSA or ECC algorithm, and cells used in the C-register of that multiplier for single-cycle and two-cycle multiplication operations. Classifications include G06F7/72 (residue arithmetic), G06F7/728 (Montgomery reduction), G06F7/724 (finite field arithmetic), and G06F7/725 (finite field arithmetic over elliptic curves).

Source: https://patents.google.com/patent/US6397241/en

What the excerpt does not establish: The supplied text is excerpted and omits the detailed description, claims, and prior-art references. It therefore does not establish the specific claimed multiplier-cell structure, claim scope or limitations, the method steps of "computing," or the cited prior art. All statements above are limited to what the excerpt provides.