Subject: Re: [PATCH v3 2/3] crypto: atmel-sha204a - fix truncated 32-byte blocking read

From: Thorsten Blum <[email-masked]>
Date: Tue, 28 Apr 2026 17:35:40 +0200

On Wed, Apr 22, 2026 at 09:09:35PM +0000, Lothar Rubusch wrote:
> The ATSHA204A returns a 35-byte packet consisting of a 1-byte count,
> 32 bytes of entropy, and a 2-byte CRC. The current blocking read
> implementation was incorrectly copying data starting from the
> count byte, leading to offset data and truncated entropy.
> 
> Additionally, the chip requires significant execution time to
> generate random numbers, going by the datasheet. Reading the I2C bus
> too early results in the chip NACK-ing or returning a partial buffer
> followed by zeros.
> 
> Verification:
> Tests before showed repeadetly reading only 8 bytes of entropy:
> $ head -c 32 /dev/hwrng | hexdump -C
> 00000000  02 28 85 b3 47 40 f2 ee  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |.(..G@..........|
> 00000010  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................|
> 00000020
> 
> After this patch applied, the result will be as follows:
> $ head -c 32 /dev/hwrng | hexdump -C
> 00000000  5a fc 3f 13 14 68 fe 06  68 0a bd 04 83 6e 09 69  |Z.?..h..h....n.i|
> 00000010  75 ff cf 87 10 84 3b c9  c1 df ae eb 45 53 4c c3  |u.....;.....ESL.|
> 00000020
> 
> Fix these issues by:
> Increase cmd.msecs to 30ms to provide sufficient execution time. Then
> set cmd.rxsize to RANDOM_RSP_SIZE (35 bytes) to capture the entire
> hardware response. Eventually, correct the memcpy() offset to index 1 of
> the data buffer to skip the count byte and retrieve exactly 32 bytes of
> entropy.
> 
> Fixes: da001fb651b0 ("crypto: atmel-i2c - add support for SHA204A random number generator")
> Signed-off-by: Lothar Rubusch <[email-masked]>
> ---
>  drivers/crypto/atmel-sha204a.c | 9 +++++++--
>  1 file changed, 7 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> 
> diff --git a/drivers/crypto/atmel-sha204a.c b/drivers/crypto/atmel-sha204a.c
> index 19720bdd446d..f7dc00d0f4cd 100644
> --- a/drivers/crypto/atmel-sha204a.c
> +++ b/drivers/crypto/atmel-sha204a.c
> @@ -19,6 +19,9 @@
>  #include <linux/workqueue.h>
>  #include "atmel-i2c.h"
>  
> +#define ATMEL_RNG_BLOCK_SIZE 32
> +#define ATMEL_RNG_EXEC_TIME 30

Maybe I missed it, but how did you arrive at 30 ms from the datasheet?

Thanks,
Thorsten