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On Wednesday, at the RSA conference in San Francisco, Microsoft veep Scott Charney outlined a new security mechanism in Windows 10 called Device Guard ( https://blogs.windows.com/business/2015/04/21/windows-10-security-innovations-at-rsa-device-guard-windows-hello-and-microsoft-passport/ ). We've taken a closer look.
The details are a little vague – more information will emerge at the Build event next week – but from what we can tell, Device Guard wraps an extra layer of defense around the operating system to prevent malware from permanently compromising a PC.
Device Guard, when enabled by an administrator, checks to see if each and every application is cryptographically signed by Microsoft as a trusted binary before it is allowed to run. Device Guard itself runs in its own pocket of memory with its own minimal instance of Windows, and is protected from the rest of the system by the IOMMU features in the PC's processor and motherboard chipset.
These IOMMU features (outlined here by the Minix project http://www.minix3.org/docs/szekeres-iommu.pdf ) wall off Device Guard from the computer's hardware, so it cannot be tampered with by other software, no matter how low level that software is.
If the Windows 10 kernel, which has control over the PC, is compromised, Device Guard will remain fire-walled off, and cannot be subverted into allowing unauthorized code to run. A hypervisor running beneath the kernel and Device Guard enforces this.
(In theory, that is – similar "secure execution environments" have been defeated in the past.)
http://atredispartners.blogspot.com/2014/08/here-be-dragons-vulnerabilities-in.html
http://blog.azimuthsecurity.com/2013/04/unlocking-motorola-bootloader.html
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/04/23/microsoft_windows_10_device_guard/
Do you think that Microsoft can make this work as described?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 26 2015, @03:55AM
Do you have anything to back up your claims? Or are you just speculating?
(Score: -1, Redundant) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 26 2015, @04:38AM
The disruption of communication and requiring cryptographically signed code can only mean one thing: invasion. The Trade Federation is making their move. Sometimes speculation is strategically necessary.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by maxwell demon on Sunday April 26 2015, @06:53AM
The summary says: Only code signed by Microsoft will be allowed to run.
Obviously only Microsoft will be able to sign code (well, and anyone managing to get Microsoft's private key; so the NSA probably will be able, too, but certainly not normal programmers). Therefore Microsoft has full control about which code runs on systems with Device Guard enabled. The whole point of signing is approving.
It is also obvious that Microsoft will take advantage of that requirement to make money. After all, it is a publicly traded company, where the investors expect that any money-making opportunity is used. Requiring the application to be sold exclusively over Microsoft Store would be one possible way for Microsoft to profit from it, and there's precedent to requiring applications to be sold through a store owned by the OS makes (namely Apple), so the idea is certainly not completely off.
Of course it might also be that Microsoft just makes the actual signing process expensive. Expensive enough that independent developers won't be able to afford it. And certainly expect Microsoft to have rules to prevent anything they don't like, as far as they can get away with it (again, there's Apple precedent).
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 26 2015, @09:57AM
Do you have anything to back up your claims? Or are you just speculating?
The OP asked two questions (just like you did). I don't see that s/he made any "claims".
Considering the "signed by Microsoft" BS that MS required in UEFI's "trusted" mode in order to boot a non-MS OS (referenced by someone else in these posts) I think Device Guard's "signed by Microsoft" requirement would be the same.
As mentioned above, this is similar to Apple's approach for applications on iOS (except Apple doesn't allow this type of "feature" to be turned off; it requires jail breaking your iOS device).