[SOLVED] Intel Loses 5X More Average Performance Than AMD From Mitigations: Report

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Solution
The "panic" here is:

A low level vulnerability is found.
The only way to mitigate it is to disable some built in functionality, the HyperThreading.
Doing this would result in some theoretical performance loss.
Loss of performance is greater in Intel vs AMD, and brings the Intel performance almost down to the level of the AMD. Therefore, Intel sux

Panic panic panic...

To date, no actual exploit has been seen. Either in the wild or in theory.
I think malwarebytes is an excellent tool, I use Windows 10 built in system but I'll occasionally download a random tool and use it with a full scan and then switch back when the "premium" trial ends. I haven't had a serious virus infection since my XP PRO days.
 
Lets look at another potential target. Long time users and contributors of forums like these. A not so wild guess will tell you we all have a tech. background. People with such backgrounds tend to work in STEM roles like IT and IS... They make more then the average random person, now you have individual high value targets. I'm just thinking of reasons to create such a software. I do not have the knowledge to actually do it however. I do agree with USAFRet. Anyone who can afford a decent system has money somewhere and if I can infect your system and wait for you to input 4367-0000-1111-1111 cvv 123 09/00 somewhere then hey what do you know I got a card number, cvv and expiration date.
 
I had a bad infection a few years ago on my laptop and my paid kasparsky labs antivirus found nothing. I downloaded malwarebytes for free and found like 200 things. After a removal, the system was back to normal. I have liked malwarebytes since.

I also have used Norton free from my ISP since it would scan everything i downloaded and automatically alert me and quarantine the file if a download was malicious. The program also could perform auto backups, defrags, and other usefull things. I have heard that this isnt great at detection tho.

Now that i have a decent pc, want nothing extra eating up my cpu cycles, and am more carefull about downloads, I have completely disabled defender (using regestry changes) on my pc since "anti malware service executable" ate some of my ram and cpu up randomly, even though defender wasnt set to run anytime. I use malwarebytes very rarily now, only if i notice something is outta whack.
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What motives would someone have for using an exploit based on any of the intel flaws? Widespread credit card theft? That would be shut down in a day. How about silently lurking and using the infected computers and servers in a Cyber war scenario? So I got you infected and I have admin rights, what if my command and control server told 35,000,000 devices to download a DDOS payload and execute with the target being a national government or military?
 
It might be shut down quickly, but the funds gained would still be worth the effort.

There are already plenty of compromised systems that are part of botnets. So many that I don;t imagine that there is much motivation to add to their numbers. Not to say that they wouldn't ultimately fin that kind of use....I just don't see that as being the primary motivation for any theoretical exploit.
 
I did not think credit cards, bit coins, financial accounts would be of much interest. But in a War scenario and you have a few Exoflops of commuting power and a significant amount of network ability then what do you do. I mentioned 35,000,000 devices thats small potatoes even with todays exploits.

Its only theoretical until someone sets their mind to it.
 
OK, I have drempt up a few uses for Intel issues with hypothetical exploits. How would we stop such exploits before they did real damage?

And be certain you understand, if a bad guy can steal $500 dollars they will... I've been victim to theft before and a lot of times the banks make you a victim too.
 
We would stop the exploits by doing what intel and other companies are doing now, scrambling to patch the issues.
I dont know what would happen if there was some bug discovered that couldnt be spftware or formware patched. They would probably try to hide it as much as possible.
 

USAFRet

Titan
Moderator
So if we go back to the original premise of this thread, and the underlying vulnerabilities...

To mitigate in the short term, it is possibly suggested that HyperThreading be turned off. Predictive code execution.
Intel chips suffer more than AMD if you do this.

OK...

Now, what is the actual attack vector based on these vulnerabilities?
 

InvalidError

Titan
Moderator
OK, I have drempt up a few uses for Intel issues with hypothetical exploits. How would we stop such exploits before they did real damage?
Simple: until someone finds a way to actually leverage those exploits in a real-world environment where the exploit has only one shot at compromising any given transaction and has no means to know when said transaction will occur, you don't need to do anything as a successful real-world exploit is somewhere between highly unlikely and impossible. Someone who really wants your data will find much easier ways to get it.

Companies are patching remotely plausible exploits to dodge potential liabilities from doing absolutely nothing about them should a practical attack using those flaws ever get found.
 
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USAFRet

Titan
Moderator
That article is a bit over my head. What is the jist?
"allowing a low-privileged user on the computer to arbitrarily modify any file, including system executables "

Suppose you follow Best Practices, and don't run your system with an Admin account all the time.
(you don't do this, right?)

Your standard user account, if somehow infected by this zero day, could access, alter and execute stuff that should only be done by the Admin.
 
It all goes back to the obvious.

The biggest problem with a PC is always between the chair and the keyboard.

You mean it's not the nut loose behind the keyboard or the ID-10-T error?

The way it usually works is someone will reverse analyze the patches and then discover the exploit. We all know the attack vector.

Then it will show up in the deepest parts of the dark web, where someone will sell it or a variant of it for $20K, $30K, $50K whatever they think it's worth.

Then the person who buys it will sell it for a little less. Pretty soon the script kiddies have it. Then you have things like WannaCry infecting your PC Office Printer because they never get updates, and it haunts your network for years.
 
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That sounds rather fantastic for hackers at least. Easy access to all sorts of high privilege tasks. There will always be hackers, and there always will be companies ready to patch them. The question is, will the patches of late that mainly affect intel, reel in the gap between intel and amd. The gap is negligible as is.

Never knew you werent supposed to use an admin all of the time. Makes sense for security reasons, but ehh, hasnt caused me any issues so far.
 

USAFRet

Titan
Moderator
The "panic" here is:

A low level vulnerability is found.
The only way to mitigate it is to disable some built in functionality, the HyperThreading.
Doing this would result in some theoretical performance loss.
Loss of performance is greater in Intel vs AMD, and brings the Intel performance almost down to the level of the AMD. Therefore, Intel sux

Panic panic panic...

To date, no actual exploit has been seen. Either in the wild or in theory.
 
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