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Intel Security Releases Detection Tool For EFI Rootkits After CIA Leak (pcworld.com)
After WikiLeaks revealed data exposing information about the CIA's arsenal of hacking tools, Intel Security has released a tool that allows users to check if their computer's low-level system firmware has been modified and contains unauthorized code. PCWorld reports: The release comes after CIA documents leaked Tuesday revealed that the agency has developed EFI (Extensible Firmware Interface) rootkits for Apple's Macbooks. The documents from CIA's Embedded Development Branch (EDB) mention an OS X "implant" called DerStarke that includes a kernel code injection module dubbed Bokor and an EFI persistence module called DarkMatter. In addition to DarkMatter, there is a second project in the CIA EDB documents called QuarkMatter that is also described as a "Mac OS X EFI implant which uses an EFI driver stored on the EFI system partition to provide persistence to an arbitrary kernel implant." The Advanced Threat Research team at Intel Security has created a new module for its existing CHIPSEC open-source framework to detect rogue EFI binaries. CHIPSEC consists of a set of command-line tools that use low-level interfaces to analyze a system's hardware, firmware, and platform components. It can be run from Windows, Linux, macOS, and even from an EFI shell. The new CHIPSEC module allows the user to take a clean EFI image from the computer manufacturer, extract its contents and build a whitelist of the binary files inside. It can then compare that list against the system's current EFI or against an EFI image previously extracted from a system.
I no longer trust Intel. Therefore why would I run this?
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
Then how can I trust Intel's code to detect rootkits?
Same applies for Motorola and AMD.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
When will people admit that [U]EFI was a mistake?
It's too much code at too low a level, and it's too easy to manipulate. I for one would rather pay a nominal fee to have a new ROM chip sent to me. Remember when you could just pop those babies in and out? Remember when we had jumpers to protect and reset BIOS, boot sectors, etc.?
Yes, [U]EFI has good features and goes far beyond what BIOS can do, but so what? Outside of supporting hardware and booting to the point of OS handoff, the BIOS (either BIOS proper or [U]EFI) is supposed to be as minimal as possible. BIOS has been hacked to hell to support all sorts of shit like that at the behest of the various motheboard manufacturers. If we just had a newer BIOS developed by a central body that didn't try to completely reinvent the wheel as a helicopter, we'd be much better off.
Link leads to github, which I've never used. Reading the manual I need to install Python using pip. Never heard of pip. Google says it's a Python package manager. Whee.
.msi file we can install that, when run, says yay or nay that the CIA/NSA/KGB/Chinese/whomever has infected your firmware.
Then I have to compile some C programs. OK.
Then I have to shutdown my system using funny flags I've never seen before. Before doing this I hope I've printed out a few pages of the manual, because the next few steps are wat do when the system won't boot.
Then I can run it.
OK, I'm technically competent. I'm kinda surprised I've had this laptop for 2 years and have yet to install Python. Oh well, not a problem. I've also got a C development system, that's easy enough. And I'm smart enough to print out the 2-3 pages of important info before shutting down my system in a funky way.
So yeah, I can install and run this. But how about grandma? She has no chance. Besides the fact she's been dead for 10 years or so, she would never be able to figure this stuff out.
What we need is a
when Intel builds a separate computing environment into their processors and chipsets, designed to operate out of control or view of the user, and then offers this EFI rootkit detection tool? Can you trust Intel?
You insensitive clods!
Intel already has a backdoor called "Intel Management Engine Interface" that can't be disabled, even if you disable Windows drivers or run Linux, it's built into the BIOS that cannot be disabled.
The UEFI/EFI itself is another layer of bullshit that makes it such a hassle to dual-boot or run non-windows OS. Try installing Linux Mint on an HP laptop and even the latest version requires you to log into the UEFI partition and rename/move the image file just so you can get grub to show up during boot (without hitting hot keys).
How do I know that Intel's utility's not going to replace it with the Microsoft version in the name of "security"?
How do I know your replacement image, if that's how it works - is not going to be Intel's compromised BS that allows even more access than the fucking Intel Management engine?
My understanding (perhaps somewhat dated) is there is modifiable code inside Intel CPUs as well. Does the CIA/NSA/whoever have the capability of silently changing that microcode so as to make their task easier (perhaps as simple/complex as detecting when certain encryption code is running, and changing the results to be cryptographically weaker)? Or is this old stuff that no longer applies?
So obviously Intel makes popular CPUs, as well as other components, in computers. If you run a system with any of those, well then they could have a back door in them and there's nothing you could do. However it goes further than that: The Intel C Compiler is EXTREMELY popular for writing software (in Windows and Linux) because it generates really optimized code. It could, of course, insert back doors in to binaries without the knowledge of the person compiling it. So you'd have to scrap anything written using it.
Really, it isn't feasible. If you are so paranoid you think Intel is spying on you or helping others spy, your probably have to go hide in a cave because there is just nothing you can really do to eliminate all risk.
At some point, you have to stop being a member of the AFDB brigade and just accept that ya, there's some risk in trusting, well, anyone but you have to and just leave it be. You also have to accept that you aren't protecting nuclear secrets, the kind of attacks against you are not the spy-agency level.
This is part of the long slow march back to locked down shitty platforms and completely closed hardware. This is the phone/appliance-ification of your shit.
People don't understand the freedoms they're losing. By the time they realize it it will be far too late (it pretty much already is at this point). Even the term "walled garden" doesn't make it sound as bad as it is.
What really gets to me is it takes talented, highly educated people in niche fields to create this shit and they're selling out hardcore to some of the worst evils imaginable and giving no fucks (the over arching cultural imperative, at least in America, of "I got mines").
It's a shame there aren't more RMS style zealots; maybe even some with billions of dollars to throw at preserving and perpetuating freedom.
I have no problem buying a new computer. But I want control of my hardware. I replace shit whether its broken or not. Just to give me something to play with. But I remember the days when you didnt have to play the "Lets break this part to make the system work right" game..
What about UEFI's "secure boot"? Wasn't it designed to prevent this kind of boot exploits, while incidentally making it a pain in the backside to run non-Microsoft OSes? So, was the executable image of the CIA exploit signed? By whose key?
I am a Linux advocate, but I have to say this is a ridiculous claim. Linux boots on UEFI just fine.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
You are confusing UEFI and Secure Boot
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
Eventually you can get Linux to boot on UEFI just fine. But it is harder than before.
It used to be that you could just put a DVD in a computer and click OK to install Linux, and that was it.
Now people people ask me for help when Linux installation fails. Usually the installation seem to succeed, but the computer cannot boot. I usually install Boot-Repair on a live USB disk, boot the computer and fix it. Boot-Repair is a nice toot but really, it should not be necessary.
And sometimes it does not work. Early versions of the Intel NUC would fail starting Ubuntu because if expected the executable to be named uefi.exe, not grub.exe. Intel fixed it in a later firmware version. But it is telling that they created something so complex, that not even Intel could get it right.
It is really another tool developed by Intel for the CIA to make hacking even easier!
All this hype is to just get you to install it!
GOTCHA - AGAIN!!!
Self-importance and self-indulgence is the root of ALL evil.