Intel issued a security warning yesterday which describes in detail the vulnerabilities in the firmware of Management Engine, Server Platform Services, and Trusted Execution Engine.
Particular care should be taken as many Intel products (processors) appear to be affected. These include Intel Core 6, 7 and 8 processors, Intel Xeon, Intel Atom, Lake Apollo and Intel Celeron.
Basically, all systems that use the versions firmware 11.0, 11.5, 11.7, 11.10 and 11.20, Server Platform Engine firmware version 4.0, and Trusted Execution Engine in version 3.0 affected by vulnerabilities.
Attackers can exploit the above vulnerabilities to gain unauthorized access to the affected systems. This way they can run code without the operating system "seeing" it, causing instability or crashes on the victim's computer.
Intel has released a download tool that can be downloaded from this website. Available from Windows 7 and later versions of Windows as well as Linux systems.
The program performs a quick scan and will return its findings to you. It will recognize if your system is vulnerable and will also show you the Intel product and firmware version.
There is currently nothing you can do to fix the vulnerability, and Intel says it depends on the OEMs and manufacturers of your systems when firmware updates are released to fix the above security issues.
This means that: If you have purchased a computer from HP, Dell, Lenovo, etc. you will have to wait until they fix the issue.
George is still wondering what he is doing here….
