Abstract
This paper presents a visionary proposal for a distributed (or decentralized) power/thermal control mechanism that applies the bio-inspired artificial intelligence paradigm of swarm intelligence. The target use case is a future many-core processor. Preliminary results based on a swarm simulator are presented. The paper then addresses the challenge of making such power control systems secure against energy attacks - i.e. maliciously launched virus programs that are designed to disrupt the power control mechanism and cause performance shortfalls or even physical damage from over-heating.