Chips fight viruses
Chips to fight viruses
Advanced Micro Devices and Intel plan to release technology that will
allow processors to stop many attacks before they occur.
Execution Protection by AMD, technology contained in AMD's Athlon 64
chips, prevents a buffer overflow, which is a common method used to
attack computers. A buffer overflow essentially overwhelms a
computer's defence systems and then inserts a malicious program in
memory that the processor subsequently executes.
With Execution Protection, data in the buffer can only be read and,
therefore, is prevented from doing its dirty work, John Morris,
director of marketing at AMD, said in an interview on Thursday at the
Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
"Now in current processors, any programs that go into the memory
overflow can be executed," he said. "With this, the system only allows
read-only in the buffer. It will not execute." The malicious program
is then disposed harmlessly when the PC is turned off, he said.
The circuitry is already inside existing Athlon 64 chips, but it can't
be activated yet. That will occur when Microsoft releases Service Pack
2 for Windows XP early in the second quarter. By then, AMD also will
have a catchy marketing name for the technology, Morris said.
Intel is putting a similar technology in Prescott, an enhanced version
of the Pentium 4 expected next month, according to computer
manufacturers. Intel declined to comment.
Security problems, of course, have become a multibillion-dollar
problem and show few signs of abating. These sorts of technologies
could undercut one of the more severe headaches out there, Morris
said.
A number of damaging worms from last year relied on buffer overflows.
Around 50 percent of the Windows security updates from Microsoft in
the last two years may have been rendered unnecessary if the
technology existed then, according to an analysis by AMD and
Microsoft.
Morris said the first full-fledged 64-bit programs for the Athlon 64
will appear this quarter. Ubisoft is slated to release a 64-bit
version of Far Cry in March, while Epic Games will release a 64-bit
version of Unreal Tournament in the first quarter.
By going to 64 bits, these games will be far more realistic, because
more complex graphics will be possible. "Now you will be able to blow
a hole in the ground and use it as a fox hole," Morris said.
