Secure Hardware Design
MIT's Secure Hardware Design course (6.5950/6.5951), taught by Professor Yan, covers both attacking modern CPUs and designing architectures resistant to those attacks. The curriculum follows a Think, Play, Do structure: lectures cover hardware security concepts within larger systems, recitations use Capture-the-Flag style competitions where students team up to solve interactive challenges, and labs have students implement real attacks on actual hardware rather than simulators. Topics include state-of-the-art hardware attacks and corresponding defenses. Materials are released as open courseware through MIT OpenCourseWare, including lecture content, recitation exercises, and lab assignments, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. The course targets students who want hands-on experience with processor security rather than purely theoretical treatment, bridging computer architecture and systems security practice.