New Intel CPU Problem: "Lazy FP State Restore"

[engine]

Intel has published another CPU vulnerability: Lazy FP state restore technique

Lazy restored states are potentially vulnerable to exploits where one process may infer register values of other processes through a speculative execution side channel that infers their value.

[intel.com...]

[QuaterPan]

When everything goes wrong,... everything goes wrong.

[IanCP]

What else is new?

At another place there was a discussion about updating a product because of its revealed vulnerabilities. I commented...

"It is absolutely VITAL you update our [insert any name of your choice] vulnerable product with a further update containing even more future vulnerabilities to keep our update department in full employment through to the next millennium".

My sarcastic comment was not appreciated at all.

I'm now 76 years of age - how many years old is the internet now? When did I get all excited my 300 baud modem was going to be improved upon?

Actually way back when - I had constructed my first microcomputer in 1977 using an RCA CPU [1602?] and 2K of RAM with a 4X4 hexadecimal keyboard and 2 digit hexadecimal display which I showed off to a friendly technician at one of my clients who was Australia's International Telecommunications Commission. The friendly technician introduced me to an early version of the internet at the work place - BBS from a distant memory.

I couldn't see a great deal of difference at the time from my telex machine with which I communicated with electronics manufacturers/suppliers around the world [cheaper than phone calls].

There were no bugs and vulnerabilities back then - OK some fool with an excavator could cut your phone line, but that still applies today.

Another thing, I'd never heard the word vulnerability until it became synonymous with Micro$oft.

More sarcasm.

[keyplyr]

"It is absolutely VITAL you update our [insert any name of your choice] vulnerable product with a further update containing even more future vulnerabilities to keep our update department in full employment through to the next millennium".

My sarcastic comment was not appreciated at all.

You're being sarcastic?

[lucy24]

some fool with an excavator could cut your phone line, but that still applies today

Oh, they don't settle for cutting your individual phone line any more. It's only a year or two since CalTrans knocked out internet for a pretty substantial* part of the state by cutting a single cable.


* Geographically substantial. Population, not so much.

[henry0]

There were no bugs and vulnerabilities back then

I guess they did exist but it was only a matter of time before someone thought about exploiting those.