This week two brand new vulnerabilities were discovered that affect PC processors of every Intel PC released in the past 20 years, bringing network security into the limelight bright and early in 2018. The vulnerabilities are being dubbed Meltdown and Spectre and they affect your PC in new and devastating ways.
Meltdown is a vulnerability that breaks the isolation between user applications and the operating system. This simply means that the walls between different applications you may be using and your operating system, like Windows 7 or 10 are down and information can be collected by your operating system and transmitted back to another party. If your PC processor is vulnerable and your operating system has not been patched, it’s simply not safe in any fashion to work with sensitive information due to the potential leaking of information. This affects both personal computers, cloud infrastructure, and business workstations that are unpatched.
The exploit was discovered and reported by three teams: Google Project Zero, Cyberus Technology, and Graz University of Technology.
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Spectre is a separate vulnerability that can break down the walls between applications running on a machine at any given time, and can trick them into leaking their secrets to each other and an outside source. Some software that might be used to help prevent these kinds of attacks can actually make the attack more likely to succeed!
Spectre was discovered by two people, Jann Horn of Google Project Zero and Paul Kocher
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Measures can be taken immediately to prevent these kinds of attacks and should be taken seriously. If you work with sensitive data, make sure the proper steps have been taken to fortify your machine and your network. VMX Technologies managed service clients have had the proper steps taken to ensure safety in the matter.
If you are interested in reading more about these attacks, the researchers who have discovered them have published extensive information online at meltdownattack.com.