After being publicized these issues Meltdown and Spectra, many users have remained with the idea that these two names are of some very dangerous viruses for their computers.
What are Meltdown and Spectre?
Meltdown and spectre are not viruses. Meltdown and Spectre are two types of vulnerabilities of the processors (CPU) present on all PCs around the world and phones. Whether they are Mac or Windows PC, all computers have at least one processor and so they can be the target of these security vulnerabilities.
In Meltdown we have to deal with a single vulnerability, while Spectre has two security vulnerabilities at CPU level. The principle of exploitation by hackers is as simple as possible. Modern processors are capable of making predictive decisions almost instantly, trying to guess what is the next sequence to be executed. Thus leading to increased response speed. If the anticipated execution does not take place, it will automatically delete from the processor. The whole process should be defined almost instantly and invisible for the application and for the operating system. However, the wrong anticipation of several execution sequences can cause small reinforcements, especially on older technology processors.
Bugs Meltdown and Spectra permit hackers To read and access this information from the Kernel memory of the OS, taking advantage of the delays in revocation of the execution sequences.
What are the devices affected by Meltdown and Spectre?
And Specter are affected Meldown all computers. Whether we are talking about Windows PC or Mac. However, if you have a newer Mac model you may not feel this vulnerability so hard.
In the case of Apple fans, things are even worse. Besides all the models of IMAC, MacBook, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, that is, all that use macos, are affected and those that run iOS and tvOS. iPhone and Appletv. Watchos are the only ones who get rid of these vulnerabilities.
How can we protect ourselves from Meltdown and Specter on the devices Apple
It is hard to say that there is a real solution protection against these vulnerabilities. Meltdown and spectre is based on a "defect" of manufacturing from the processing architecture. Therefore, solving this problem is largely in Intel. For Windows PC users, Intel has already launched BIOS updates To close these vulnerabilities, but it is not safe for how long.
Apple has launched Macos, iOS and TVos updates since December since December, meant to mitigate the risk created by Meltdown and Spectre. In macOS High Sierra 10.13.2 Supplemental Update, Apple has currently set a vulnerability to spectra and introduced a Security Patch For Safari and Webkit, in order to mitigate vulnerability to macos.
The same thing happened for iPhone users. In iOS 10.2.2 a few security patches are brought against spectra.
So the best protection solution is to keep yourself away from dubious sites, not install applications from unknown sources or "hack" applications and especially to Keep up up to date MacOS, iOS and TVos operating systems.
Allow and delay without delay any update that comes for Google Chrome, Firefox, Opera or another Internet browser you use.
Apple promises to make updates regularly to stop the effects of these vulnerabilities, and in the future we hope that they will no longer be a problem.
How Meltdown affects us and Specter
Currently, it is just a significant slowing down on computers and iPhone devices. The applications open harder, the media content no longer run fluently, a delayed response in the execution of certain operations.
