Patent ID: 8615665

Claim:
A method for booting a plurality of computer processors in a device designed for communicating sensitive information, comprising: loading from an external source exclusively into a first non-volatile memory of said device a computer software package that includes software required for booting each of said plurality of computer processors, said computer software package being stored in an encrypted form and said first non-volatile memory being external to said plurality of computer processors; copying from said first non-volatile memory to each of a plurality of second non-volatile memories, which are each provided exclusively for a respective one of said plurality of computer processors, an image comprising at least a portion of said computer software package that includes software required for only booting a respective computer processor of said plurality of computer processors; prior to processing said sensitive information with any of said plurality of computer processors, verifying an absence of any modification of said image for each said computer processor relative to an original authentic version of said image; and storing in a decrypted form said image for each of said plurality of computer processors in a respective one of a plurality of volatile memories internal to said plurality of computer processors if it is verified that said image is absent of any modification.