Lasers and Acid and Chips, oh my! (Decapping Integrated Circuits at Home)

Join us for our monthly meetup! This month’s speaker is Aaron Wasserman giving their talk: Lasers and Acid and Chips, Oh My! (Decapping Integrated Circuits at Home).

Aaron is an IoT penetration tester who sometimes gets to play the part of a mad scientist. That was never more true than on a recent project where he built a home lab for ripping open integrated circuits—better known as decapping ICs.

In this talk, Aaron will crack open the weird and wonderful world of chip decapsulation. Think of it as a mix of chemistry set, hacker lab, and a dash of “don’t try this at home” (unless you really like goggles and lab coats). Safety will be a recurring theme, since melting chips with acid and lasers isn’t exactly risk-free.

He’ll share his approach: how he picked his decapping methods, cobbled together a DIY lab, and pulled off the delicate balance of digging into chips without destroying them. You’ll also hear about his first experiments, what worked, what didn’t, and what future “mad scientists” can do to take it further.

Aaron Wasserman is a Senior Security Engineer at Praetorian and a member of the IoT Penetration Testing team. Aaron is dedicated to advancing cybersecurity practices and sharing knowledge within the community. He holds a Master’s and Bachelor’s from Georgia Tech’s School of Electrical and Computer Engineering and several offensive security certifications, including the ACIP and OSCP.

Come hang out, learn how hackers peel back the silicon, and see what secrets ICs are hiding right in your own backyard!