avatarTanmay Deshpande

Summary

The website content discusses the widespread impact of the CPU vulnerabilities known as Meltdown and Spectre, which affect a vast array of devices and have prompted technology companies to issue patches and security updates.

Abstract

The website article titled "Q: Am I affected by the CPU Vulnerability? A: Most Certainly, Yes!" addresses the recent discovery of critical vulnerabilities in CPUs that can lead to attacks named Meltdown and Spectre. These vulnerabilities, found by Google Project Zero, compromise the isolation between applications and the operating system, as well as between different applications, potentially allowing attackers to access sensitive data. The article emphasizes that these hardware bugs affect a broad range of processors, including those from AMD, ARM, and Intel, and that virtually all types of computing devices, such as desktops, laptops, mobile phones, and smart devices, are susceptible. The article also provides resources for further reading and advises users to apply security patches from vendors as soon as they become available, noting that some updates may require system restarts.

Opinions

  • The author believes that the CPU vulnerabilities are a significant concern for everyone, not just those in the technology sector.
  • The article suggests that the vulnerabilities are severe enough to warrant immediate attention and action from both service providers and end-users.
  • It is implied that the impact of these vulnerabilities is so extensive that it is nearly impossible to detect if an attack has occurred due to the lack of traceable evidence.
  • The author recommends staying informed about updates from cloud service providers like Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, as they are actively working to mitigate the risks associated with these vulnerabilities.
  • The article conveys a sense of urgency for readers to keep their systems updated with the latest security patches to protect against potential exploitation of these CPU flaws.

Q: Am I affected by the CPU Vulnerability? A: Most Certainly, Yes !

If you are related to the technology world or not, the latest buzz around CPU Vulnerability by now would have got your attention. In this post, I am trying to bring some light on this topic with some interesting resources that I have got from the internet.

MELTDOWN & SPECTRE

What is this CPU Vulnerability ?

Google Project Zero team recently discovered vulnerabilities in CPUs which when exploited can lead to attacks like Meltdown and Spectre. These hardware bugs allow programs to steal data which is currently processed on the computer.

What is Meltdown?

Meltdown attack breaks the fundamental isolation between applications and operating system. This attack can gain access to the memory and can steal information from other programs.

What is Spectre?

Spectre attack on other hand, breaks the separation/isolation between different applications. This attack allows attacker to tweak any program to start leaking the sensitive information.

What all processors are affected?

Probably all. To confirm, Google Project Zero team ran PoCs on following -

  • AMD FX(tm)-8320 Eight-Core Processor
  • AMD PRO A8–9600 R7, 10 COMPUTE CORES 4C+6G
  • An ARM Cortex A57 core of a Google Nexus 5x phone
  • Intel(R) Xeon(R) CPU E5–1650 v3 @ 3.50GHz

Can I detect if somebody exploited these on my machines?

Probably not as these does not keep any trace.

What all types of machines have been affected?

Desktops, Laptops, Mobile Phones and most of the smart devices. Most of the Cloud Services providers which use Intel CPUs and Xen PV.

I am using Google Services, where can I find information about it ?

Here is a detailed blog on what all Google provided services are affected — https://security.googleblog.com/2018/01/todays-cpu-vulnerability-what-you-need.html

It is also recommended to keep an eye on Google Cloud Security Bulletins and follow the instructions.

I am using Microsoft Services, where can I find information about it?

Microsoft has published the details about this vulnerability on blog — https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/securing-azure-customers-from-cpu-vulnerability/

As per the blog, The majority of Azure infrastructure has already been updated to address this vulnerability. Some aspects of Azure are still being updated and require a reboot of customer VMs for the security update to take effect.

What do I do now?

While most of the vendors are already working on providing a patch, please make sure to apply those as soon as possible. Some of the updates require restarts, so please make sure you do.

Where can I do more reading?

  1. Google Project Zero Blog Page — https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.in/2018/01/reading-privileged-memory-with-side.html
  2. Meltdown Attack — https://meltdownattack.com/
  3. Spectre Attack — https://spectreattack.com/
  4. RHEL Blog about this vulnerability — https://access.redhat.com/security/vulnerabilities/speculativeexecution

Hope this is helpful ! Stay alert and stay safe !

Tech
Technology
Cloud Computing
Android
Security
Recommended from ReadMedium
avatarAlexander Nguyen
The resume that got a software engineer a $300,000 job at Google.

1-page. Well-formatted.

4 min read
avatarHùng Trần
Stop using if-else statements in Java

The tale goes that there is an ancient legacy system, my colleague coded thousands of lines from top to bottom, and each block added…

7 min read
avatarRabinarayan Patra
Why 1==1 is true but 128==128 is false in Java

Ever wondered why comparing 1==1 returns true, but 128==128 returns false in Java? Let’s dive into the magic of Integer caching to find…

4 min read
avatarSurabhi Gupta
Why 500 LeetCode Problems Changed My Life

How I Prepared for DSA and Secured a Role at Microsoft

5 min read
avatarAustin Starks
I used OpenAI’s o1 model to develop a trading strategy. It is DESTROYING the market

It literally took one try. I was shocked.

8 min read
avatarAndrew Zuo
Async Await Is The Worst Thing To Happen To Programming

I recently saw this meme about async and await.

5 min read