Researchers discover potentially catastrophic exploit present in AMD chips for decades

[Kaz]

Researchers discover potentially catastrophic exploit present in AMD chips for decades

WWW.ENGADGET.COM

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Researchers discovered a potentially catastrophic vulnerability in AMD chips that has been there for decades. It’s called a ‘Sinkclose’ flaw.

 

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Security researchers have found a vulnerability in AMD processors that has persisted for decades, according to reporting by Wired. This is a fascinating security flaw because it was found in the firmware of the actual chips and potentially allows malware to deeply infect a computer’s memory.

 

The flaw was discovered by researchers from the security firm IOActive, who are calling the AMD-based vulnerability a “Sinkclose" flaw. This potentially allows hackers to run their own code in the most privileged mode of an AMD processor, System Management Mode. This is typically a protected portion of the firmware. The researchers have also noted that the flaw dates back to at least 2006 and that it impacts nearly every AMD chip.

 

If you follow the links to IOactive, they give some references including an old talk by Christopher Domas, which in my opinion was revolutionary at the time.  Domas proved that hardware companies were intentionally backdooring their CPUs.  Surprise surprise, someone eventually found AMD's backdoor.  Domas quit being vocal on the scene after he was hired by Intel.  There is an upcoming talk at Defcon scheduled for tomorrow (August 10th, 2024). 

 

[Kaz]

https://www.amd.com/en/resources/product-security/bulletin/amd-sb-7014.html