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SAFE(4)			    Kernel Interfaces Manual		       SAFE(4)

NAME
       safe -- SafeNet SafeXcel	1141/1741 crypto accelerator

SYNOPSIS
       To  compile  this  driver into the kernel, place	the following lines in
       your kernel configuration file:

	     device crypto
	     device cryptodev
	     device safe

       Alternatively, to load the driver as a module at	boot time,  place  the
       following line in loader.conf(5):

	     safe_load="YES"

       In sysctl.conf(5):

	     hw.safe.debug
	     hw.safe.dump
	     hw.safe.rnginterval
	     hw.safe.rngbufsize
	     hw.safe.rngmaxalarm

DEPRECATION NOTICE
       The  safe  driver  is  deprecated  and  is  scheduled  for  removal  in
       FreeBSD 16.0.

DESCRIPTION
       The safe	driver supports	cards containing  SafeNet  crypto  accelerator
       chips.

       The safe	driver registers itself	to accelerate AES, SHA1-HMAC, and NULL
       operations for ipsec(4) and crypto(4).

       On  all	models,	 the driver registers itself to	provide	random data to
       the random(4) subsystem.	 Periodically the driver will poll  the	 hard-
       ware  RNG  and  retrieve	data for use by	the system.  If	the driver de-
       tects that the hardware RNG is resonating with  any  local  signal,  it
       will  reset the oscillators that	generate random	data.  Three sysctl(8)
       settings	control	 this  procedure:  hw.safe.rnginterval	specifies  the
       time, in	seconds, between polling operations, hw.safe.rngbufsize	speci-
       fies  the  number  of  32-bit  words  to	 retrieve  on  each  poll, and
       hw.safe.rngmaxalarm specifies the threshold for resetting the  oscilla-
       tors.

       When  the  driver  is  compiled	with SAFE_DEBUG	defined, two sysctl(8)
       variables are provided for debugging purposes: hw.safe.debug can	be set
       to a non-zero value to enable debugging messages	to be sent to the con-
       sole for	each cryptographic operation,  hw.safe.dump  is	 a  write-only
       variable	 that can be used to force driver state	to be sent to the con-
       sole.  Set this variable	to "ring" to dump the current state of the de-
       scriptor	ring, to "dma" to dump the hardware DMA	registers, or to "int"
       to dump the hardware interrupt registers.

HARDWARE
       The safe	driver supports	the following SafeXcel chips:

	     SafeNet 1141    The original chipset. Supports  DES,  Triple-DES,
							       AES,  MD5,  and
							       SHA-1 symmetric
							       crypto	opera-
							       tions,	  RNG,
							       public key  op-
							       erations,   and
							       full	 IPsec
							       packet process-
							       ing.
	     SafeNet 1741    A faster version of the 1141.

SEE ALSO
       crypt(3),   crypto(4),	intro(4),   ipsec(4),	random(4),  crypto(7),
       crypto(9)

HISTORY
       The safe	driver first appeared in FreeBSD 5.2.	It  is	deprecated  in
       FreeBSD 15.0 and	removed	in FreeBSD 16.0.

BUGS
       Public key support is not implemented.

FreeBSD	ports 15.quarterly     October 31, 2025			       SAFE(4)

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