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Hyperthreading Considered Harmful
cperciva writes "Hyper-Threading, as currently implemented on Intel Pentium Extreme Edition,
Pentium 4, Mobile Pentium 4, and Xeon processors, suffers from a serious
security flaw. This flaw permits local information disclosure, including
allowing an unprivileged user to steal an RSA private key being used on the
same machine. Administrators of multi-user systems are strongly advised
to take action to disable Hyper-Threading immediately.
I will be presenting this attack at
BSDCan 2005 at 10:00 AM EDT on May 13th, and at the conclusion of my talk
I will also releasing a paper describing the attack and possible mitigation
strategies."
to give their hyper-threading processors some Ritalin.
Shit, did anyone see that blur???
Yeah, I think that was Intel's server market going right out the window at Mach 10...
I am counteracting the harmful effects of hyperthreading by eating a high-fiber diet. So far, I haven't had any problems.
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
Ooooo, I'm SCARED!
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
Maybe there are still unsold tickets for BSDCan05.
Slashdot: Where nerds gather to pool their ignorance
Jason? Is that you? (or your evil geeky twin brother?)
...I'm glad I'm stuck with a 1-gig Pentium III.
You can hold down the "B" button for continuous firing.
With Moore's Law still holding up, isn't it a little early to be using up names like "Extreme Edition?" So, I'd like to propose my own corollary to Moore's Law:
"The microprocessor industry will run out of hyperbole long before they run out of transistors."
The only acceptable defense of scientific results is to say that they were the product of the Scientific Method.
There's only a remote possibility people will RTFA when it DOES exist. To calculate the possibility you're talking about will require hours of CPU time. Actualy, hours * ~1.5 CPU time, because for some strange reason my HT is now disabled.
Hal Spacejock: Science Fiction with Nuts
Did anyone else notice the Intel advert for "Hyper Threading Linux" at the top of the google ads on the article page?
I wonder how much revenue he'll get from this announcement?
And I note that if you are a SCO user, you always had disabled hyper threading anyway. Not sure what to make of that.
Note to ACs: I won't mod you up, even if you are being funny or insightful. So take a chance! It's not real life!
I guess I need to shut off hyperthreading on our app server before the users who can't sort an Excel spreadsheet have a chance to expliot the vulnerability.
...it appears Windows XP Starter Edition may be the most secure option after all...
Hyperthreading is teh suck because I found a flaw.
I'm not going to tell you how it works until I get a chance to stand up in front of a buch of people and sound smart. In the meantime you can disable HT.
I can write.
The flaw affects BSD's and OpenServer for sure.
I'm unemployed, so give me money to find more flaws.
Intel rocks!
Yup...that's pretty much it. Or did I miss something?
Be Safe! Sleep with a Marine. Semper Fi!
My web domain.
Microsoft has issued a patch in response to this "significant" security threat
You can download RIDDILIN.EXE to address the hyper-thread exploit from their update site...
Bill Gates assures me in a very personal email, installing this patch will fix the flaw, send me $5 for every other person who installs it... and Intel's stock will go up too. It's win-win...
Everyone should do it...
As we all know, this includes Linux :-)
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