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Title: Rebooting Computers to Avoid Meltdown and Spectre

Abstract

Security vulnerabilities such as Meltdown and Spectre demonstrate how chip complexity grew faster than our ability to manage unintended consequences. Here, attention to security from the outset should be part of the rememdy, yet complexity must be controlled at a more fundamental level.

Authors:
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4]
  1. Georgia Inst. of Technology, Atlanta, GA (United States)
  2. Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
  3. Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa (Israel)
  4. Hewlett Packard Labs, Palo Alto, CA (United States)
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Sandia National Lab. (SNL-NM), Albuquerque, NM (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA)
OSTI Identifier:
1459993
Report Number(s):
SAND2018-6948J
Journal ID: ISSN 0018-9162; 665142
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC04-94AL85000
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Computer
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 51; Journal Issue: 4; Journal ID: ISSN 0018-9162
Publisher:
IEEE
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING; rebooting computing; meltdown; spectre; security; complexity; hardware; state machine abstraction; hackers

Citation Formats

Conte, Thomas M., Debenedictis, Erik P., Mendelson, Avi, and Milojicic, Dejan. Rebooting Computers to Avoid Meltdown and Spectre. United States: N. p., 2018. Web. doi:10.1109/MC.2018.2141022.
Conte, Thomas M., Debenedictis, Erik P., Mendelson, Avi, & Milojicic, Dejan. Rebooting Computers to Avoid Meltdown and Spectre. United States. https://doi.org/10.1109/MC.2018.2141022
Conte, Thomas M., Debenedictis, Erik P., Mendelson, Avi, and Milojicic, Dejan. Fri . "Rebooting Computers to Avoid Meltdown and Spectre". United States. https://doi.org/10.1109/MC.2018.2141022. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1459993.
@article{osti_1459993,
title = {Rebooting Computers to Avoid Meltdown and Spectre},
author = {Conte, Thomas M. and Debenedictis, Erik P. and Mendelson, Avi and Milojicic, Dejan},
abstractNote = {Security vulnerabilities such as Meltdown and Spectre demonstrate how chip complexity grew faster than our ability to manage unintended consequences. Here, attention to security from the outset should be part of the rememdy, yet complexity must be controlled at a more fundamental level.},
doi = {10.1109/MC.2018.2141022},
journal = {Computer},
number = 4,
volume = 51,
place = {United States},
year = {Fri Apr 27 00:00:00 EDT 2018},
month = {Fri Apr 27 00:00:00 EDT 2018}
}

Journal Article:
Free Publicly Available Full Text
Publisher's Version of Record

Figures / Tables:

Figure 1. Figure 1.: Microprocessors follow the state machine abstraction at two levels. They are state machines that advance at the rate of the system clock and state machines that advance at the rate of instruction processing. Prior to the advent of cache memory, the two state machines advanced in time atmore » a fixed rate relative to each other, but the rate is variable in today's complex processors and becomes a side channel that can convey sensitive data to hackers.« less

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Works referencing / citing this record:

Exploration for Software Mitigation to Spectre Attacks of Poisoning Indirect Branches
journal, September 2018


Figures / Tables found in this record:

    Figures/Tables have been extracted from DOE-funded journal article accepted manuscripts.