A research paper released on Friday by Oxford University computer science student Colin Percival details a method by which an attacker could heist cryptography keys on servers running Intel processors with Hyperthreading.
Hyperthreading technology runs two threads or streams of data, making computer software view a single processor as two.
The exploit Percival details takes advantage of the threads' shared access to memory caches within the processor to interpret data that's being processed and thus lift the keys. A software timing attack basically watches the behavior of a computer in an effort to expose protected information.
From Percival's Page:
Hyper-Threading, as currently implemented on Intel Pentium Extreme Edition, Pentium 4, Mobile Pentium 4, and Xeon processors, suffers from a serious security flaw. This flaw permits local information disclosure, including allowing an unprivileged user to steal an RSA private key being used on the same machine. Administrators of multi-user systems are strongly advised to take action to disable Hyper-Threading immediately; single-user systems (i.e., desktop computers) are not affected.
I presented details of how to exploit this security flaw at BSDCan 2005 in Ottawa on May 13th, 2005. For those who were unable to attend my talk, I have written a 12-page paper, Cache Missing for Fun and Profit, discussing this flaw and related problems, both realized and theoretical.
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