Flash encryption is enabled but through OTA, plaintext image is working. Is it recommended ?

draval
Posts: 3
Joined: Fri May 14, 2021 3:18 pm

Flash encryption is enabled but through OTA, plaintext image is working. Is it recommended ?

Postby draval » Tue May 18, 2021 5:37 am

Hi all,

Currently I have worked on task where I encrypted the program flash in release mode with externally generated 256 bit key. Now I have verified that plain text firmware is not working on my board when i download image serially. That is what i wanted.

Now i want clarification on OTA updates. I did OTA of plaintext firmware image. It worked successfully. Is it ok ? Or even in the ota also image should be encrypted!!

We are using esp_ota_write API for writing OTA.

Below one is our flash_partition.csv file.

# Name, Type, SubType, Offset, Size, Flags
# Note: if you change the phy_init or app partition offset, make sure to change the offset in Kconfig.projbuild,,,,
phy_init, data, phy, 0x9000, 0x1000,
otadata, data, ota, , 0x2000,
factory,0,0, 0x10000, 2M,
ota_0, app, ota_0, , 2M,
ota_1,0, ota_1, , 2M,
nvs, data, nvs, , 0x60000,

how plaintext image is able to run in the encrypted flash? Is it recommended to have plaintext image at OTA ?

Waiting for quick reply.

WiFive
Posts: 3529
Joined: Tue Dec 01, 2015 7:35 am

Re: Flash encryption is enabled but through OTA, plaintext image is working. Is it recommended ?

Postby WiFive » Tue May 18, 2021 11:34 pm

When the plaintext ota image is written to the flash it is encrypted. So you have to decide if it is a risk to have plaintext ota image on the server. If server is secure and it is downloaded over https with mutual auth then maybe it is secure enough.

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