CoreGuard by Dover Microsystems is a cybersecurity solution designed as silicon IP to prevent the exploitation of software vulnerabilities and protect embedded systems against network-based attacks. It integrates with RISC architectures, providing separate sentry logic that monitors every instruction executed by the host processor. CoreGuard ensures compliance with security, safety, and privacy rules, stopping any instruction that violates these rules before damage can occur. The system employs a hardware interlock to manage communication between the host processor and external peripherals, verifying all data through its Policy Enforcer. CoreGuard uses updatable micropolicies installed on the SoC to differentiate between valid and invalid instructions, and maintains metadata about every piece of data and instruction executed by the host processor.
