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posted by Fnord666 on Sunday January 07 2018, @11:18PM   Printer-friendly
from the everyone-out-of-the-pool dept.

Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:

Qualcomm has confirmed its processors have the same security vulnerabilities disclosed this week in Intel, Arm and AMD CPU cores this week.

The California tech giant picked the favored Friday US West Coast afternoon "news dump" slot to admit at least some of its billions of Arm-compatible Snapdragon system-on-chips and newly released Centriq server-grade processors are subject to the Meltdown and/or Spectre data-theft bugs.

[...] Qualcomm declined to comment further on precisely which of the three CVE-listed vulnerabilities its chips were subject to, or give any details on which of its CPU models may be vulnerable. The paper describing the Spectre data-snooping attacks mentions that Qualcomm's CPUs are affected, while the Meltdown paper doesn't conclude either way.

[...] Apple, which too bases its iOS A-series processors on Arm's instruction set, said earlier this week that its mobile CPUs were vulnerable to Spectre and Meltdown – patches are available or incoming for iOS. The iGiant's Intel-based Macs also need the latest macOS, version 10.13.2 or greater, to kill off Meltdown attacks.

Google has decided to publicly disclose the well speculated on CPU based security flaw ahead of their original schedule as a response to the rapidly increasing amount of information that is becoming available. It's official: Google was able to construct a PoC that can read kernel memory at a speed around 2000 bytes per second from a user space application. An overview of the situation is available at the Project Zero blog. Despite the AMD Linux kernel patch that disables the existing known mitigation for their processors Google specifically names AMD CPUs as suffering from the flaw along with Intel and ARM.

Linus Torvalds: "Is Intel basically saying 'We are committed to selling you shit forever and ever, and never fixing anything'?"

Linux creator Linus Torvalds has had some harsh words for Intel in the course of a discussion about patches for two bugs that were found to affect most of the company's processors. [...] Torvalds was clearly unimpressed by Intel's bid to play down the crisis through its media statements, saying: "I think somebody inside of Intel needs to really take a long hard look at their CPUs, and actually admit that they have issues instead of writing PR blurbs that say that everything works as designed."

The Finn, who is known for never beating about the bush where technical issues are concerned, questioned what Intel was actually trying to say. "Or is Intel basically saying 'we are committed to selling you shit forever and ever, and never fixing anything'?" he asked. "Because if that's the case, maybe we should start looking towards the ARM64 people more."

Intel Says Updates Will Render Systems "Immune" to Meltdown and Spectre Exploits

What does "immunity" to the "Meltdown" bug mean, and at what cost does it come?

Intel says it has developed and is issuing updates for all types of Intel-based machines that will "render those systems immune from both exploits (referred to as 'Spectre' and 'Meltdown') reported by Google Project Zero. "Intel has already issued updates for the majority of processor products introduced within the past five years," says an Intel spokesperson. "By the end of next week, Intel expects to have issued updates for more than 90 percent of processor products introduced within the past five years."

Intel's reference to "immune" is an interesting twist in this saga. The New York Times reported yesterday that Spectre fixes will be a lot more complicated as they require a redesign of the processor and hardware changes, and that we could be living with the threat of a Spectre attack for years to come. Intel's wording appears to suggest that this isn't the case for its own processors and security fixes.

Intel is facing class action lawsuits over Meltdown:

Just days after The Register revealed a serious security hole in its CPU designs, Intel is the target of three different class-action lawsuits in America.

Complaints filed in US district courts in San Francisco, CA [PDF], Eugene, OR [PDF], and Indianapolis, IN [PDF] accuse the chip kingpin of, among other things, deceptive practices, breach of implied warranty, negligence, unfair competition, and unjust enrichment.

The RISC-V Foundation would like to remind you that RISC-V is not affected.

Previously: Major Hardware Bug Quietly Being Patched in the Open
Patch for Intel Speculative Execution Vulnerability Could Reduce Performance by 5 to 35% [Update: 2]
Don't Expect Intel Chip Recall After Spectre and Meltdown, CEO Says



Original Submission #1Original Submission #2Original Submission #3Original Submission #4Original Submission #5

 
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  • (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @11:34PM (6 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday January 07 2018, @11:34PM (#619327)

    This is just getting started. Some bright spark last year decided to start fuzzing CPU instructions. This is something the chip manufactures should have been doing. They better get on it ASAFP. Security and tech through obscurity does not work. When everyone learns this lesson yet again. We all get to pay for it. They are going to find more and more just like this for a long time.

    This means things like pretty much all new cars have it. Your routers have it. Your internet modems have it. That oh so clever internet connected thermostat will have it. So on and so on. This is going to be *ugly*.

    Starting Score:    0  points
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    Extra 'Interesting' Modifier   0  

    Total Score:   2  
  • (Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @12:28AM (1 child)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @12:28AM (#619339)

    The Kind Rapist. A legend or reality? The answer to that is, as you may have guessed, unconfirmed. You decide.

    Rumor has it that there exists a rapist who is unbelievably kind to those he rapes. There are various stories that tell of his kindness. One story states that, after raping and murdering a 9 year old female child, he magnanimously threw a half-eaten lolly pop on the corpse. Another story states that he only beat and raped a woman who casually strolled past him a billion times for her heinous transgressions. Yet another story states that he always rapes with a gentle smile on his face. All of these stories have one obvious commonality, which is that they portray this individual as gentle and merciful, perhaps even as a saint.

    The story of The Kind Rapist is sure to live on for many generations. But is it just a story?

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:41AM

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:41AM (#619387)

      This individual has been repeatedly posting NOISE about body parts and sex with children and such.

      Yes, it is "Offtopic".
      If that is how you mod it, however, those posts won't get the attention they deserve from the site's staff and the serial abuser will continue to abuse the site.

      The correct mod for posts in this continuous stream of noise is SPAM.

      -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @12:42AM (3 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @12:42AM (#619346)

    The notion that "security by obscurity doesn't work" doesn't mean what you think it means.

    It means that if you try to keep your mechanisms secret, you'll probably be compromised. This is because your particular, individual ideas are probably not that smart; it's much better to use mechanisms that have been vetted by very many intelligent people over a lengthy period of time, and which have already been proven under real-world attacks.

    The mechanisms of a lock, though public knowledge, are buried obscurely in a metal body.

    Your cryptographic key is a number that is so obscure, it's nearly impossible to guess.

    • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @02:44AM (2 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @02:44AM (#619375)

      I would be money that if you asked a HW eng from intel a few years ago if it is possible they would have said 'nope too hard' 'is it doced?' 'nah doesnt matter its impossible'.

      It means exactly what I stated. You are being too narrow and pedantic.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:53AM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:53AM (#619393)

        It appears that you are asking if it is accompanied by a guide. [google.com]

        If I was going to shorten the word "documented", I would have done it thusly: doc'd.

        You are being too narrow and pedantic.

        Heh, and you thought -he- was.

        -- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:07PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday January 08 2018, @03:07PM (#619518)

        Got it.