A simple on-wafer monitoring device that we developed showed that the increase in electrical current in silicon dioxide film corresponded completely to the increase in interface states at the interface between silicon dioxide and silicon under plasma irradiation, as measured by a charge pumping current method in a metal-oxide-semiconductor transistor. Using an electron spin resonance spectrometer, we found that the E' centers in the silicon dioxide also increase. An experiment using helium (He), argon (Ar), and oxygen (O-2) plasmas showed that the electrical current, interface states, and E' centers depend on the wavelength of vacuum ultraviolet protons in the plasma. Under the same plasma density, the plasmam-induced cur-rent in He plasma is the largest of the three gas plasmas. In the same way, the interface states and E' centers increased the most for He plasma. This strongly implies that the plasma-induced carriers (holes and electrons) that generate the electrical current in the insulator directly or indirectly affect the bonding of silicon to oxygen in SiO2 and the increase in the interface states at the boundary between SiO2 and Si in metal-oxide-semiconductor (MOS) devices. The simple on-wafer monitoring for plasma-induced current that we developed can predict the generation of SiO2-Si interface states as plasma-induced damage in MOS devices. (C) 2005 American Vacuum Society.