SAFE(4)                FreeBSD 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 hardware RNG
     and retrieve data for use by the system.  If the driver detects 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 specifies the number of
     32-bit words to retrieve on each poll, and hw.safe.rngmaxalarm specifies
     the threshold for resetting the oscillators.

     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
     console 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
     console.  Set this variable to "ring" to dump the current state of the
     descriptor 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 operations,
                           RNG, public key operations, and full IPsec packet
                           processing.
           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 15.1-STABLE-HBSD       October 31, 2025                        SAFE(4)