science

PSA Certified

PSA Certified is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand PSA Certified rather than just read about it. In short: Platform Security Architecture (PSA) Certified is a security certification scheme for Internet of Things (IoT) hardware, software and devices. It was created by Arm Holdings, Brightsight, CAICT, Prove & Run, Riscure, TrustCB and UL as part of a global partnership.

Key takeaways

PSA Certified belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect PSA Certified to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of PSA Certified from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Platform Security Architecture (PSA) Certified is a security certification scheme for Internet of Things (IoT) hardware, software and devices. It was created by Arm Holdings, Brightsight, CAICT, Prove & Run, Riscure, TrustCB and UL as part of a global partnership. Arm Holdings first brought forward the PSA specifications in 2017 to outline common standards for IoT security. The PSA Certified assurance scheme launched two years later in 2019. Governance of the PSA Certified scheme was transferred from Arm and other founding partners to GlobalPlatform in September 2025.

History In 2017, Arm Holdings created Platform Security Architecture (PSA), a standard for IoT security. It was built to include an array of specifications such as threat models, security analyses, hardware and firmware architecture specifications, and an open-source firmware reference implementation. It aimed to become an industry-wide security component, with built-in security functions for both software and device manufacturers. PSA has since evolved to become PSA Certified, a four-stage framework which can be used by IoT designers for security practices. In 2018, the first IoT threat models and PSA documents were published. The certification of PSA Certified launched at Embedded World in 2019, where Level 1 Certification was presented to chip vendors. A draft of Level 2 protection was presented at the same time. Six of the seven founding stakeholders created the PSA Certified specifications, which are now make up the PSA Joint Stakeholders Agreement. The stakeholders are Arm Holdings, Brightsight, CAICT, Prove & Run, Riscure and UL. TrustCB became the seventh PSA Certified JSA member, acting as an independent Certification Body for the scheme. Out of the six other founding members, four are security test laboratories, which includes Brightsight, CAICT, Riscure and UL. The first PSA Certified Level 2 certificates were issued to chip vendors in February 2020. The first PSA Certified Level 3 certificate was issued in March 2021.

Certification The PSA Joint Stakeholders Agreement outlines how members can create a worldwide standard for IoT security that enables the electronic industry to have an easy to understand security scheme. The security certification scheme documents enable a security-by-design approach to a diverse set of IoT products. The scheme starts with a security assessment of the chip and its Root of Trust (RoT) and then builds outwards to the system software and device application code. PSA Certified specifications are implementation and architecture agnostic so can be applied to any chip, software or device. PSA Certified aims to removes industry fragmentation for IoT product manufacturers and developers in a number of ways. The world's leading IoT chip vendors are delivering system-on-chips built with a PSA Root of Trust (PSA-RoT) providing a new security system with built-in security functions that software platforms and original device manufacturers (OEMs) can make use of.

Functional API certification A high-level set of APIs are provided by the PSA-RoT to abstract the trusted hardware and firmware used by different chip vendors. These APIs include:

PSA Cryptography API PSA Attestation API PSA Storage API Open source API test suites are available to check compliance for PSA Functional API Certification. An open-source implementation of the PSA Root of Trust APIs is provided by the TrustedFirmware.org project.

Levels

Level 1 The first level of security certification for PSA Certified is Level 1, aimed at chip vendors, software platforms and device manufacturers. The certification consists of questions, document review and an interview by one of the certification labs. The completed answers are accompanied with explanatory notes, checked by the certification lab. According to the PSA Certified website, language and mappings align with other important IoT requirements, such as standards and laws. These include NISTIR 8259, ETSI 303 645 and SB-327.

Level 2 The mid-level security certification involves testing by a security lab, focusing on source code review and the PSA Root of Trust (PSA-RoT), over the course of a month to attain the level 2 certification. This process focuses on carefully defined attack methods and utilizes a set evaluation methodology. It also ensures hardware must support PSA-RoT functions and is therefore aimed at chip vendors. According to Forbes, they believed Level 2 was likely to become the most common level for consumer IoT applications.

Level 3 The final level extends the criteria of Level 2 to include protection against various physical attacks and side-channel attacks.

References

External links Official website

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with PSA Certified

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what PSA Certified claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to PSA Certified before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about PSA Certified ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of PSA Certified

In research: PSA Certified appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses PSA Certified in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: PSA Certified is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Internet of things companies, Internet security, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for PSA Certified outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study PSA Certified in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what PSA Certified means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain PSA Certified out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is PSA Certified in simple terms?

Why does PSA Certified matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study PSA Certified?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on PSA Certified.