11 May 2020

GlobalPlatform, the provider for secure digital services and devices, RISC-V International, a global non-profit consortium, announce the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU). Collaboration between the two organisations will help accelerate the development of open standards for the hardware design of embedded components in connected devices for the Internet of Things (IoT). This includes processors embedded with Trusted Execution Environment (TEEs), which are witnessing significant growth.

In 2019, GlobalPlatform reported a 50 percent year-on-year increase in the number of GlobalPlatform-compliant TEEs being shipped. Aligning specifications and exchanging information on known hardware vulnerabilities and the required functionalities to overcome them, will enable GlobalPlatform and RISC-V to update each organisation’s their respective technical documents and frameworks to address the evolving security needs of the IoT ecosystem. Short to mid-term examples are expected to include a focus on application programming interfaces (APIs) for the TEE, as well as microcontroller (MCU) protection profiles and the appropriate security extensions.