"Unpatchable Vulnerability in Apple's M-Series Chips Leaks Secret Encryption Keys"
Originally Published 1 year ago — by The Hacker News
A new vulnerability named GoFetch has been discovered in Apple M-series chips, allowing attackers to extract secret encryption keys by exploiting a microarchitectural side-channel attack related to the data memory-dependent prefetcher (DMP). This vulnerability poses a serious threat to the security of constant-time cryptographic implementations, rendering them susceptible to key-extraction attacks. The flaw cannot be fixed in existing Apple CPUs, requiring cryptographic library developers to take preventive measures, potentially impacting performance. Additionally, a new GPU attack affecting popular browsers and graphics cards has been demonstrated, leveraging specially crafted JavaScript code to infer sensitive information, impacting all operating systems and browsers implementing the WebGPU standard.