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In the case of Spectre, the vulnerability exists in CPU architecture rather than in software, and is not easily patched however, this vulnerability is more difficult to exploit.Īfter patching, performance impacts may vary, depending on use cases.
#Microsoft spectre meltdown software#
NCCIC encourages users and administrators to refer to their hardware and software vendors for the most recent information. Branch Target Injection: CVE-2017-5715 (Spectre Variant 2).Bounds Check Bypass: CVE-2017-5753 (Spectre).Rogue Data Cache Load: CVE-2017-5754 (Meltdown).Common Vulnerability and Exposure (CVE):.More details of these attacks can be found here:
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Spectre affects almost all devices including desktops, laptops, cloud servers, and smartphones. The name derives from "speculative execution"-an optimization method a computer system performs to check whether it will work to prevent a delay when actually executed. Meltdown is a bug that "melts" the security boundaries normally enforced by the hardware, affecting desktops, laptops, and cloud computers. Spectre is a flaw an attacker can exploit to force a program to reveal its data. These vulnerabilities can be exploited to steal sensitive data present in a computer systems' memory.ĬPU hardware implementations are vulnerable to side-channel attacks, referred to as Meltdown and Spectre. On January 3, 2018, the National Cybersecurity and Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) became aware of a set of security vulnerabilities-known as Meltdown and Spectre-that affect modern computer processors.
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