A method and system are provided for authenticating and securing an embedded device using a secure boot procedure and a full non-volatile memory encryption process that implements Elliptic Curve Pinstov-Vanstone Signature (ECPV) scheme with message recovery on a personalized BIOS and master boot record. The signature includes code that is recovered in order to unlock a key that is in turn used to decrypt the non-volatile memory. The use of ECPVS provides an implicit verification that the hardware is bound to the BIOS since the encrypted memory is useless unless properly decrypted with the proper key.