Winston
Lorenzo von Matterhorn
- Joined
- Jan 31, 2009
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Sigh, the never ending story. Cloud servers would be the primary target.
New Intel security flaw affects CPUs as far back as 2008 (and all the way to i9-9900K)
Researchers say the new MDS attacks are 'worse than Spectre.'
https://www.pcgamer.com/new-intel-security-flaw-affects-cpus-as-far-back-as-2008/
It's worth noting that these MDS attacks do not affect AMD processors. That shouldn't be too surprising, as the attacks rely on knowing and using low level architectural elements of the processor. A completely different architecture (eg, AMD's Zen used in its Ryzen CPUs) would of necessity require a different form of attack. Ryzen systems are safe from these specific MDS vulnerabilities, but that might be because researchers are focusing first on Intel hardware, since it's the dominant solution (particularly for cloud servers).
That doesn't mean AMD CPUs are in the clear, however—just as with the original Meltdown and Spectre exploits, this is untamed territory and security researchers expect to discover more variations in the coming months. The list of similar exploits has grown over the past year, including Foreshadow, Spoiler, Lazy FPU Restore, and other side-channel attacks. Still, AMD's latest CPUs so far have managed to avoid coming up as vulnerable in most of the other exploits.
However you slice it, this is yet another red flag in the world of CPUs. If you've been hanging onto an older PC because it's 'fast enough,' upgrading just for the security benefits might start to sound reasonable. Unfortunately, with even 9th Gen Intel being affected at some level (more mitigations are in the works), picking a truly safe CPU might prove difficult. As we said last year, this is clearly not the last we've heard of this sort of attack or exploit.
New Intel security flaw affects CPUs as far back as 2008 (and all the way to i9-9900K)
Researchers say the new MDS attacks are 'worse than Spectre.'
https://www.pcgamer.com/new-intel-security-flaw-affects-cpus-as-far-back-as-2008/
It's worth noting that these MDS attacks do not affect AMD processors. That shouldn't be too surprising, as the attacks rely on knowing and using low level architectural elements of the processor. A completely different architecture (eg, AMD's Zen used in its Ryzen CPUs) would of necessity require a different form of attack. Ryzen systems are safe from these specific MDS vulnerabilities, but that might be because researchers are focusing first on Intel hardware, since it's the dominant solution (particularly for cloud servers).
That doesn't mean AMD CPUs are in the clear, however—just as with the original Meltdown and Spectre exploits, this is untamed territory and security researchers expect to discover more variations in the coming months. The list of similar exploits has grown over the past year, including Foreshadow, Spoiler, Lazy FPU Restore, and other side-channel attacks. Still, AMD's latest CPUs so far have managed to avoid coming up as vulnerable in most of the other exploits.
However you slice it, this is yet another red flag in the world of CPUs. If you've been hanging onto an older PC because it's 'fast enough,' upgrading just for the security benefits might start to sound reasonable. Unfortunately, with even 9th Gen Intel being affected at some level (more mitigations are in the works), picking a truly safe CPU might prove difficult. As we said last year, this is clearly not the last we've heard of this sort of attack or exploit.
