Messages in this thread | | | Subject | Re: Intel microcode fixes [OFF-TOPIC] | Date | Fri, 20 Nov 1998 17:38:12 +0000 | From | David Woodhouse <> |
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jfulmer@appin.ml.org said: > In a serious note (microcode viruses aside), I don't think that I or > many other people even knew that Intel's microcode was changeable. I > wonder what the security implications could be?
> Does Linux protect the cpu at all in this instance?
Speaking purely from conjecture, I'd assume that you have to be in ring 0 to change the microcode, and ISTR you might even have to do it while booting - before ever switching to protected mode.
So at the worst, you have to be root (and use iopl()) to do it. I don't think we need to worry too much.
---- ---- ---- David Woodhouse David.Woodhouse@mvhi.com Office: (+44) 1223 810302 Project Leader, Process Information Systems Mobile: (+44) 976 658355 Axiom (Cambridge) Ltd., Swaffham Bulbeck, Cambridge, CB5 0NA, UK. finger dwmw2@ferret.lmh.ox.ac.uk for PGP key.
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