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Researchers Find a Way To Disable Intel ME Component Courtesy of the NSA (bleepingcomputer.com)
An anonymous reader writes:Researchers from Positive Technologies -- a provider of enterprise security solutions -- have found a way to disable the Intel Management Engine (ME), a much-hated component of Intel CPUs that many have called a secret backdoor, even if Intel advertised it as a "remote PC management" solution. People have been trying for years to find a way to disable the Intel ME component, but have failed all this time. This is because disabling Intel ME crashes computers, as Intel ME is responsible for the initialization, power management, and launch of the main Intel processor.
Positive Technologies experts revealed they discovered a hidden bit inside the firmware code, which when flipped (set to "1") will disable ME after ME has done its job and booted up the main processor. The bit is labelled "reserve_hap" and a nearby comment describes it as "High Assurance Platform (HAP) enable." High Assurance Platform (HAP) is an NSA program that describes a series of rules for running secure computing platforms. Researchers believe Intel has added the ME-disabling bit at the behest of the NSA, who needed a method of disabling ME as a security measure for computers running in highly sensitive environments.
The original submission linked to a comment with more resources on the "Intel CPU backdoor" controversy.
Positive Technologies experts revealed they discovered a hidden bit inside the firmware code, which when flipped (set to "1") will disable ME after ME has done its job and booted up the main processor. The bit is labelled "reserve_hap" and a nearby comment describes it as "High Assurance Platform (HAP) enable." High Assurance Platform (HAP) is an NSA program that describes a series of rules for running secure computing platforms. Researchers believe Intel has added the ME-disabling bit at the behest of the NSA, who needed a method of disabling ME as a security measure for computers running in highly sensitive environments.
The original submission linked to a comment with more resources on the "Intel CPU backdoor" controversy.
Well, if it's any consolation to you, you're never going to gain any sort of power, and nobody really wants to look at whatever is on your screen, beyond stealing your credit card number.
What people like you seem to fail to understand is that if I can collect and store data on EVERYBODY then in the future if I happen to be pissed off at YOU for whatever reason, I can go back through all that data I've collected and find something you said or did which I can use against you. Because EVERYONE commits some crime or other. EVERYONE. Government should never have such power.
"Give me 6 lines written by the most honest of men and in them I will find something which will hang him" -- Cardinal Richelieu
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
The bleepingcomputer's article is informative, the researcher's blog post is full of technical details... but how do I actually disable Intel ME? Where is the how-to for that?
>"What people like you seem to fail to understand is that if I can collect and store data on EVERYBODY then in the future if I happen to be pissed off at YOU for whatever reason, I can go back through all that data I've collected and find something you said or did which I can use against you. Because EVERYONE commits some crime or other. EVERYONE. Government should never have such power."
+1,000,000 insightful
Not just government, NOBODY should have that power. Not governments, not businesses, not individuals. NOBODY. There are so many laws and regulations on the books, it is nearly impossible for any normal person to be 100% legal all the time. And each year it just gets worse. And that is just law- it doesn't have to be something illegal, it can just be something embarrassing to then be used as a weapon to harm or corrupt.
And even if there is some saintly person out there who thinks they never did anything wrong or embarrasing, I have news for you:
1) Anything you do can be taken out of context.
2) With power over your computer, anything can be PLANTED to make it seem like you did or said or contemplated something you never did.
3) Nobody is that saintly anyway.
Anything you did not say too. In fact these days any activity can be taken as a reason to smash your doors, put you in handcuffs and charge you with some silly crime. It seems the whole world is going this way. Even in what used to be peaceful Germany you can get that done to you now if your political opponents or some worried citizens dislike your prepping activities - 'he is evil terrorist because he has a weeks worth supply of food in his cellar' etc Seems to me that free world is as mad as the less free versions.