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I'm not trying to suggest that Apple's ARM chips are magically better because they're designed by Apple. Rather that the x86 architecture is obviously very long

I'm not trying to suggest that Apple's ARM chips are magically better because they're designed by Apple. Rather that the x86 architecture is obviously very long in the tooth and now would be a great time to switch to a far more modern architecture especially in light of this steady stream of vulnerabilities and defects that keep being found in x86. I'm sure ARM64 isn't perfect but I've yet to learn of something as severe as this, or Spectre, or Meltdown.

Remnant44 3y ago
Almost all of these exploits are due to the out-of-order/speculative execution.. which is incredibly complicated. There is no reason to believe that an out of order architecture that has not been hardened is any better at defense here than x86 - Just that as a minority architecture, it's still less profitable to target for exploitation. I have very little faith that the Apple ARM chips do better here without extensive exploit attempts made...
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
coder543 3y ago
Just as a couple of examples… ARM has suffered from Spectre too: https://developer.arm.com/Arm%20Security%20Center/Spectre-BHB https://developer.arm.com/Arm%20Security%20Center/Spectre-BH... There was also PACMAN: https://appleinsider.com/articles/22/06/10/new-pacman-flaw-in-apple-silicon-is-an-echo-of-spectre-and-meltdown https://appleinsider.com/articles/22/06/10/new-pacman-flaw-i... Speculative vulnerabilities have virtually nothing to do with the instruction set. Changing the language of the processor has little to do with how the processor works under the hood, especially for fundamental technologies like speculative execution. Also, as a corollary, speaking the same language doesn’t mean every vulnerability is shared. AMD does not seem affected by Downfall, for instance.
- stalfosknight 3y ago
  I did not know about PACMAN!
tedunangst 3y ago
Today you get to learn that there were ARM CPUs affected by Meltdown as well, including those sold by Apple.

Remnant44 3y ago

Almost all of these exploits are due to the out-of-order/speculative execution.. which is incredibly complicated. There is no reason to believe that an out of order architecture that has not been hardened is any better at defense here than x86 - Just that as a minority architecture, it's still less profitable to target for exploitation. I have very little faith that the Apple ARM chips do better here without extensive exploit attempts made...

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

coder543 3y ago

Just as a couple of examples… ARM has suffered from Spectre too: https://developer.arm.com/Arm%20Security%20Center/Spectre-BHB https://developer.arm.com/Arm%20Security%20Center/Spectre-BH... There was also PACMAN: https://appleinsider.com/articles/22/06/10/new-pacman-flaw-in-apple-silicon-is-an-echo-of-spectre-and-meltdown https://appleinsider.com/articles/22/06/10/new-pacman-flaw-i... Speculative vulnerabilities have virtually nothing to do with the instruction set. Changing the language of the processor has little to do with how the processor works under the hood, especially for fundamental technologies like speculative execution. Also, as a corollary, speaking the same language doesn’t mean every vulnerability is shared. AMD does not seem affected by Downfall, for instance.

stalfosknight 3y ago
I did not know about PACMAN!

tedunangst 3y ago

Today you get to learn that there were ARM CPUs affected by Meltdown as well, including those sold by Apple.