1. A method for providing a secure execution environment for program code, comprising: offloading code from a host processor to a secure asset management unit (SAMU) in an encrypted format for authenticating and for maintaining confidentiality of the code; determining whether the code is intended for consumption internal or external to the SAMU; and applying, on a condition that the code is intended for consumption external to the SAMU, standard advanced encryption standard (AES) encryption of the sensitive data, and on a condition that the code is intended for consumption only within the SAMU, performing a modulated AES decryption on a memory read operation into an instruction cache or a data cache, and performing a modulated AES encryption on a memory write operation as lines of the instruction cache or the data cache are flushed, wherein the modulated AES encryption and the modulated AES decryption are modulated using proprietary scrambling in hardware before and after a standard AES process.