IC Flash Recovery is a process to extract code of MCU memory content, and copy the firmware to new Microcontroller for IC cloning;
Semi-invasive IC Flash Recovery, like invasive ic attack, require depackaging the chip to get access to the chip surface. But the passivation layer of the chip remains intact – semi-invasive ic break methods do not require electrical contact to the metal surface, so there is no mechanical damage to the silicon.
As invasive ic hacks are becoming constantly more demanding and expensive, with shrinking feature sizes and increasing device complexity, semi-invasive ic flash recovery become more attractive as they do not require very expensive tools and give results in a shorter time. Also, being applied to a whole transistor or even a group of transistors they are less critical to the small feature size of modern chips.