Thursday, August 6th 2020
Intel Hit by a Devastating Data Breach, Chip Designs, Code, Possible Backdoors Leaked
Intel on Thursday was hit by a massive data-breach, with someone on Twitter posting links to an archive that contains the dump of the breach - a 20-gigabyte treasure chest that includes - but not limited to - Intel Management Engine bringup guides, flashing tools, samples; source code of Consumer Electronics Firmware Development Kit (CEFDK); silicon and FSP source packages for various platforms; an assortment of development and debugging tools; Simics simulation for "Rocket Lake S" and other platforms; a wealth of roadmaps and other documents; shcematics, documents, tools, and firmware for "Tiger Lake," Intel Trace Hub + decoder files for various Intel ME versions; "Elkhart Lake" silicon reference and sample code; Bootguard SDK, "Snow Ridge" simulator; design schematics of various products; etc.
The most fascinating part of the leak is the person points to the possibility of Intel laying backdoors in its code and designs - a very tinfoil hat though likely possibility in the post-9/11 world. Intel in a comment to Tom's Hardware denied that its security apparatus had been compromised, and instead blamed someone with access to this information for downloading the data. "We are investigating this situation. The information appears to come from the Intel Resource and Design Center, which hosts information for use by our customers, partners and other external parties who have registered for access. We believe an individual with access downloaded and shared this data," a company spox said.
Source:
Tom's Hardware
The most fascinating part of the leak is the person points to the possibility of Intel laying backdoors in its code and designs - a very tinfoil hat though likely possibility in the post-9/11 world. Intel in a comment to Tom's Hardware denied that its security apparatus had been compromised, and instead blamed someone with access to this information for downloading the data. "We are investigating this situation. The information appears to come from the Intel Resource and Design Center, which hosts information for use by our customers, partners and other external parties who have registered for access. We believe an individual with access downloaded and shared this data," a company spox said.
151 Comments on Intel Hit by a Devastating Data Breach, Chip Designs, Code, Possible Backdoors Leaked
Edit: its less clear now, but this was a reply to someones low quality 'hidden' post
www.techpowerup.com/270706/intel-preparing-avengers-branded-ka-processors
The first is hackers. They are always looking for that next sweet magic exploit and when one is found...
The second is liability. No company wants to be liable for the PR shit-storm and legal nightmare, not to mention that not all governments play nice together and so on.
The idea of officially deliberate backdoors is sheer lunacy. Now the idea of "accidental" or "unintentional" backdoors "engineered" into software/hardware by government operatives embedded within Intel... Far more plausible... And very difficult to prove...
And why is the poster encouraging people to look for mentions of "backdoors" in the code? Exactly how many seconds does it take to search for that string?Why?
Anything relying on obscurity is not secure in the first place.What precisely proves what specifically?
The fact that something got leaked, or something in the leak?
I'm actually surprised this doesn't happen all the time. With thousands of engineers working on specs and code, it's impossible to keep full control over the data without hampering development.
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I thought I'd seen it all, but apparently a thread about Intel can even descend into misquoting scripture and the end of times. I don't know where TPU draws the line on blasphemy, but this might be threading into dangerous territories.
I never saw this coming!
Intel have thousands of engineers working on various parts of CPU designs (plus thousands of former engineers), then they have many partnerships with research at universities, and all kinds of business partners and third-party developers, all of these are under some kind of NDA and access to varying degrees of sensitive information. Do you really expect all of these (tens of thousands of people) to stay 100% loyal and not do a single mistake to get compromised themselves?
The reality is valuable information is going to get leaked, sometimes not to the general public or sometimes it flies under the radar. But it's very likely that it's going to get out there some day.
Which new CPU would you buy ?