Effects of Kerr Nonlinearity in Physical Unclonable Functions

Abstract

We address the question of whether the presence of Kerr nonlinearity in multiple-scattering optical media offers any advantage with respect to the design of physical unclonable functions. Our results suggest that under certain conditions, nonlinear physical unclonable functions can be more robust against the potential cloning of the medium relative to their linear counterparts that have been exploited in the context of various cryptographic applications.