Improving IoT Cybersecurity Performance with Lifecycle-Motivated Bit-Manipulation Compiler Optimizations
Year: 2026
Type: article
Abstract: Implementing cryptographic primitives on resource-constrained IoT devices involves tight latency, code-size, and energy budgets. This work proposes a general LLVM backend instruction-selection strategy that recognizes single-bit update idioms-typically expressed as LOAD--(AND/OR)--STORE sequences in SHA-256 and similar bit-oriented code-and lowers them to the most efficient target-specific bit-manipulation primitive when legality and cost conditions are met. As a concrete instantiation, we implement the strategy for the Renesas RL78/G23 ISA by rewriting eligible patterns into SET1/CLR1 instructions when the constant mask targets exactly one bit. We evaluate the resulting backend on an RL78/G23 platform using cycle counts and code size (bytes) across SHA-256-driven workloads motivated by firmware integrity checking, Merkle-tree hashing, HMAC-based authentication, password-based key derivation (PBKDF2), and chunk-level update validation. The observed cycle reductions are also converted to absolute time across the device's supported on-chip oscillator frequencies to quantify latency impact under different clocking modes. The experimental validation in this work is limited to the RL78/G23 backend implementation. The underlying instruction-selection idea may be adaptable to other RL78-family devices or to other embedded architectures that provide equivalent single-bit set/clear or bitfield operations; however, such adaptations require target-specific legality checks, cost modeling, and separate experimental validation.
Source: Sensors
DOI: 10.3390/s26113301
Authors: Alexia Budiul, Ciprian Pungilă
Institution: West University of Timişoara
Language: English
Subfield: Artificial Intelligence
Field: Computer Science
Domain: Physical Sciences
Open Access status: gold
Estimated APC paid: $3,137
OpenAlex ID: W7162105634