“Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007) • Hacker News Board

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#71

Post by alex_duf » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 12:53 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #60

jlgaddis wrote: post #13

This image is linked in the e-mail thread, with (some of?) the errata: https://www.geek.com/images/geeknews/2006Jan/core_duo_errata... I'm just surprised that the URL is still valid after 12 years!

same, and don't bother reading too much, the best bugs came after ... incredible how I (we) ran on buggy hardware for so long. We should fund a tiny group for sane cpu design.

That would be great.

I know nothing about low level programming, and I'm wondering if webassembly couldn't be a good place to start designing CPU instruction sets?

Can someone more competent on the matter tell me if this idea is crazy?

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#72

Post by protomikron » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 12:58 PM UTC

alex_duf wrote: post #71

agumonkey wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

same, and don't bother reading too much, the best bugs came after ... incredible how I (we) ran on buggy hardware for so long. We should fund a tiny group for sane cpu design.

That would be great. I know nothing about low level programming, and I'm wondering if webassembly couldn't be a good place to start designing CPU instruction sets? Can someone more competent on the matter tell me if this idea is crazy?

> Can someone more competent on the matter tell me if this idea is crazy?

Yes, it's crazy. :)

But seriously, the ISA (instruction set architecture) is not the problem, but the optimizations (deep pipelines and speculative execution, etc.) are.

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#73

Post by taneq » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 1:51 PM UTC

tracker1 wrote: post #51

endymi0n wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Concurrency You forgot 2) Cache invalidation and 3)

The two most difficult things in software development. * naming things * cache invalidation * off by one errors

It's always worth having it stated in the canonical form. :)

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#74

Post by GalacticDomin8r » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 1:59 PM UTC

forapurpose wrote: post #28

colemannugent wrote: post #3

Wow. This is bad for Intel. Industry experts have been expressing concerns for this for ten years. Does this open Intel up to possible repercussions?

> Industry experts have been expressing concerns for this for ten years. AFAICT, de Raadt was concerned about Intel in general, but not the recent exploits in particular. We can find endless criticisms of every major company from the last 10 years (including on HN!); picking this one mailing list posting is bit arbitrary in the context of these exploits, even if de Raadt makes some good general points.

They were more than general points. Please don't poo-poo this as some sort of horoscope doom and gloom post. He specifically pointed out the the issues addressed in the recent disclosures:

> It is not just buggy, but Intel has gone further and defined "new ways to handle page tables" (see page 58).

The MMU, page tables, and TLB are all directly related.

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#75

Post by seventydwarves » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 2:01 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #59

paulhodge wrote: post #20

If only he had come up with a catchy name and a logo, we would have listened.

the movie was released in 2015, you're asking for the impossible

"Spectre" is a pretty cool and spooky name all by itself.

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#76

Post by siwatanejo » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 2:02 PM UTC

zingmars wrote: post #67

siwatanejo wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> > Opensource software is, by default, non-malicious. > So is closed source software. Sorry what? 99.999999% of all the malware that exists and has existed today, is/was closed source. Compare that to the other 0.0000001% that got once or twice into opensource and was removed as soon as it got detected. > The main ones are 1. untrusted users being hosted 2. javascript off the web. I've never talked about (1), of cou…

Your stats need a citation, otherwise they mean nothing. CVE lists have plenty of entries for FOSS software, so it's definitely not '99.whatever' you're claiming.

Are you fucking serious? CVEs are for security vulnerabilities, not for malware. It's you who has to demonstrate to me that it isn't the case. Just find more than 3 cases in history of opensource malware, and you refute my theory.

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#77

Post by endorphone » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 2:04 PM UTC

chris_wot wrote: post #35

andrewstuart wrote: post #33

There's nothing prescient about saying that computer system X or Y can be exploited in ways yet to be discovered. The entire Internet is wide open, the holes just aren't known yet.

You miss the point. Theo wasn't just hand waving, he had identified specific issues that he believed would eventually get exploited.

"he had identified specific issues that he believed would eventually get exploited"

But those aren't the issues that were exploited. His post has absolutely nothing to do with the current issues. It's just uninformed dogpiling (the ignorance of the crowd).

All chips have errata. This post is not particularly informative or relevant to anything.

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#78

Post by jokoon » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 2:04 PM UTC

I know I will sound like a conspiracy theorist, but can those bugs be intentional? I mean if you are a security agency, would it be possible to push for the introduction of such bugs?

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#79

Post by zamber » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 2:13 PM UTC

seventydwarves wrote: post #75

agumonkey wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the movie was released in 2015, you're asking for the impossible

"Spectre" is a pretty cool and spooky name all by itself.

Spectre (2015), from IMDB:

> A cryptic message from Bond's past, sends him on a trail to uncover a sinister organization. While M battles political forces to keep the Secret Service alive, Bond peels back the layers of deceit to reveal the terrible truth behind S.P.E.C.T.R.E.

Catchy, on point pop-culturally and ominous.

Re: “Intel Core 2 bugs will assuredly be exploitable from userland code” (2007)

#80

Post by baldfat » Fri, Jan 05, 2018, 2:14 PM UTC

rdtsc wrote: post #4

linohh wrote: post #2

Has HN begun to collect suggestions to intel how to handle the situation and what to change regarding community interaction to reduce the impact of such flaws? Instead of bashing our heads out, maybe it's time to offer them a hand when they're down on the ground.

I am sure Intel will be fine. It is effectively a monopoly in the desktop and server market and enjoyed their position and profits for years. They can handle a bit of criticism from a bunch of nerds on HN. Maybe loading data speculatively across a protection boundary was careless. It seems besides the latest ARM CPUs no other vendor went that route. But not owning up to it and issuing PR statements saying "This works…

> It is effectively a monopoly in the desktop and server market

But it couldn't be better timing for ARM. AMD isn't the competition (Though this helps them a little bit) it really is all about ARM and it is going to get a lot more attension with this. Windows runs on ARM now.

CPUs can't get much smaller. It is now how many cores and thermal control you can place on a waffer. ARM has the advantage in both of those. We just have to learn how to utilize multiple cores better than we are now.