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Reminds me of a presentation I saw last year on a mathematically unhackable web server. It was essentially a giant lookup table (no RAM), and making the slight
by madengr 10y ago
Reminds me of a presentation I saw last year on a mathematically unhackable web server. It was essentially a giant lookup table (no RAM), and making the slightest change required re-synthesis. But it was unhackable.
- sbierwagen 10y ago"Unhackable" is an awful... strong claim. Link?
- chillacy 10y agoHow will you modify a giant lookup table where the values are fixed in hardware? It's read-only. It's almost like saying a metal pipe is unhackable: it's just a piece of hardware. (barring breaking into the hosting provider, going to the machine and re-synthesizing the hardware, or messing with other layers between users and the host)
- sbierwagen 10y agoHow will you modify a giant lookup table where the values are fixed in hardware? It's read-only. So what? The Heartbleed attack didn't modify OpenSSL at all, yet it was a colossally awful vulnerability. "The running process cannot be modified" does not mean it is "unhackable". A static lookup table could still enable all sorts of awful bugs. How do you guarantee all the entries are good, and don't have any unfortunate side-effects? I asked for a link so I could evaluate the actual system, rather than debate its theoretical merits.
- pflanze 10y agoBut then read-only just means unmodifiable? How does it matter whether it's a lookup table or CPU code in ROM or whatever? And the OP said "mathematically unhackable", not unmodifiable. But for me it seems completely in the open what that means, and I support my fellow poster asking for a link.