Exploiting the Conditional Branch Predictor
AMD ID: AMD-SB-7015
Potential Impact: N/A
Severity: N/A
Summary
Researchers from the University of California San Diego have shared with AMD a paper titled “Pathfinder: High-Resolution Control-Flow Attacks Exploiting the Conditional Branch Predictor” that explores methods for forcing a branch predictor to mis-predict on Intel® CPUs.
No exploit against AMD products is demonstrated in the paper, but AMD recommends following previously published guidance regarding Spectre type attacks: https://www.amd.com/content/dam/amd/en/documents/epyc-technical-docs/tuning-guides/software-techniques-for-managing-speculation.pdf
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