On Sun, Aug 12, 2018, 12:38 PM D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <
talk@gtalug.org> wrote:
This Turing Award Winners talk is quite insigtful.
Full title: "A New Golden Age for Computer Architecture:
Domain-Specific Hardware/Software Co-Design, Enhanced Security, Open
Instruction Sets, and Agile Chip Development"
The speakers are key figures in the RISC revolution.
John L. Hennessy and David A. Patterson
<https://www.acm.org/hennessy-patterson-turing-lecture>
Note: they mean that it is a golden age for researchers. Not so good
for users.
Interesting stuff thanks.
I just came across this info on the hidden RISC in VIA chipsets now aka the rosenbridge backdoor.
Apparently it was discovered by reading through some linked patent records. He has fuzzy tools so you can check your own hardware.
Some wag deemed it a "ring 4" exploit.
The rosenbridge backdoor is a small, non-x86 core embedded alongside the main x86 core in the CPU. It is enabled by a model-specific-register control bit, and then toggled with a launch-instruction. The embedded core is then fed commands, wrapped in a specially formatted x86 instruction. The core executes these commands (which we call the 'deeply embedded instruction set'), bypassing all memory protections and privilege checks.