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P-MAPS: An on-demand hardware-rooted system for protecting critical applications |
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Since our last virtual discussion (June 2008), malware attacks continue to rise, and more so, attacks have continued to become stealthy and targeted. We have completed a key milestone for our software protection research last month; we created a research prototype of a hardware-assisted application protection capability called “Processor-Measured Application Protection Service (P-MAPS)”. The goal of this work has been to significantly reduce the Trusted Computing Base (TCB) from a full Operating System to a substantially smaller P-MAPS layer to improve the runtime security of critical applications running within the OS. The main contributions of our work are the on-demand trusted instantiation of P-MAPS and the use of P-MAPS to protect applications without interrupting the natural operation of the application or the Operating System. With P-MAPS enabled on a platform, day-0 attacks and attempts by unknown malware to attack critical applications can be mitigated. We built the P-MAPS layer to be OS-agnostic; an untrusted OS-specific service is used on the platform that runs within a commodity OS. Initially, the OS is in the TCB - the P-MAPS launch put the platform in a reduced-TCB state (with the OS outside the TCB). The OS-specific P-MAPS service can be triggered by the user/OS launching an application that uses P-MAPS for protection, and can be torn-down securely when not needed by any protected applications. The P-MAPS TCB consists of the CPU, the verified chipset and platform firmware. We use Intel® TXT to measure the P-MAPS layer which allows the P-MAPS Core to be independent of the chipset. The chipset specific code is contained in the Authenticated Chipset Module (or ACM) that is signed by Intel. The processor (via the Intel® TXT GETSEC instruction set) verifies the ACM. Additionally, the ACM can verify the P-MAPS measurement against a Launch Control Policy embedded on the platform. This approach protects the user for malicious software that may try to spoof the P-MAPS layer or try to deny P-MAPS execution. To protect the applications after the P-MAPS layer has been launched in a trusted manner, we use Intel® VT capabilities. Note that with P-MAPS active, we have moved the OS execution into “guest” mode. The applications that “register” with the P-MAPS are subject to an in-memory authentication process after which they are protected as was described in our previous post. Protected applications can continue executing within the OS without any disturbance to the OSes operation or the operation of other unprotected applications. We have written several applications that use the P-MAPS to provide three core security properties: 1. Isolation of the application’s runtime memory from other software on the platform, 2. Encapsulation of the application data memory such that only code in the measured application pages can access the data. 3. Prevention of circumvention of any function entry-points exposed in the application code. A protected application typically involves handling of secret data that is provisioned by a Provisioning Entity (Server) in the network. We have built P-MAPS such that the hardware can authenticate the P-MAPS core when it interacts with the platform root of trust (in our case, a Trusted Platform Module or TPM) which can then be used to provide hardware-derived quotes to a trusted remote entity. The TPM quotes are used by the remote entity to verify that the application is indeed executing with the required hardware-derived protection. A set of trusted third parties participate to enable this attestation mechanism as in a standard Public Key Infrastructure mechanism. Our P-MAPS TCB is substantially smaller (~2500x smaller compared to a commodity OS) TCB. We continue to strive to reduce this TCB layer, and analyze requirements that different applications impose on the P-MAPS, as well as do performance analysis of the overheads while it executes. |
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20/04/2009 04:51 PM
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At Fall IDF 2008, Intel presented solutions toward realizing a vision that can accelerate secure Internet transactions by orders of magnitude. Our vision was of a world where the internet is entirely secure and attackers have no place to hide. A major step toward realizing this vision of world-wide security is making sure that all the traffic exchanged between servers and clients is encrypted. This is very difficult technical challenge since networking speeds are excessively high (10-100 Gbps), whereas cryptographic algorithms consume millions of processor cycles to execute. Since IDF, we have also worked on designing new cryptographic algorithms that can potentially offer new security/performance tradeoffs and be essential components of future computing platforms and networks. In this blog we summarize our past as well as recent accomplishments. First, the latest Intel® Core? micro-architecture (Nehalem) re-introduces the feature of Simultaneous Multi-threading Technology, SMT into the CPU. SMT is ideal for hiding the cycles of compute-intensive public key encryption software under the stall times of network application memory lookups. Following Nehalem, Westmere adds new instructions for potentially speeding up symmetric encryption by a factor of 3-4X. These instructions not only provide better performance but also protect applications against an importance type of threats known as side channel attacks. Third, Intel® has developed superior Integer arithmetic software that can speed key exchange and establishment procedures by a factor of 2X. Last, we have developed a new cryptographic hash function called Vortex that can be implemented using our new processor instructions. Vortex is one of the fastest collision resistant hashes known to us when implemented on Intel processors. A main strength of the Vortex design is that this hash function can achieve a potential performance of much less than 7 cycles per byte using the AES round and carry-less multiply instructions announced for future Intel processors. The Vortex family produces message digests of 224, 256, 384 and 512 bits. The main idea behind Vortex is to use well known algorithms with very fast diffusion in a small number of steps. These algorithms also balance the cryptographic strength that comes from iterating block cipher rounds with S-box substitution and diffusion against the need to have a lightweight implementation with as small a number of rounds as possible. |
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20/04/2009 12:01 PM
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Is the value of patch management decreasing? Some experts say, due to a rise in privately held vulnerabilities, the value of patch management is eroding. Others feel patching is losing the race and becoming too little and too late with the rapid development of attackers. I too have chimed in on the topic and stated patching all vulnerabilities is not economical, as most are never widely exploited. But does this mean we should be looking at alternate paths, away from patch management? I stand firm in support of the end-node update concept, but take a slightly different view of the scope and value. I see Attacks are constantly changing.Mapping defense-in-depth model shows it allows for Prevention of exposure to known vulnerabilities where patches exist.Overall, actively managing end-node security via The question still remains, from a measures and metrics perspective, how best can we show and quantify the benefits, efficiency, and value. |
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20/04/2009 08:16 AM
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Quick Overview of the Parallel Programming & Multi-Core Community |
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I put together a three minute video to give new visitors to the Intel Software Network some quick pointers to the most useful features, benefits and resources of the Parallel Programming & Multi-Core Community. Please take a moment to watch the video and if you want a quick link I have included the text with links for you to find the information fast. Let me know what you think.
Hello, My name is Aaron Tersteeg and I?m the community manger for the Intel Software Network?s Parallel Programming and Multi-Core community. As the community manager I?m focused on providing developer with the resources they need to and I invite you to join the community at software.intel.com and click on the Parallel Programming link. http://software.intel.com/en-us/articles/multi-core/code/1/ An Experimental Tools and Technology section that we call ?What If Software? that gives developer access to features and libraries that we are considering for future software product. Support of Intel Tools like Vtune and Thread Checker as well as Intel Software Libraries to make sure that your applications run best on today?s chips as well as tomorrows. Recommend reading list to help you build a solid foundation in new programming technology or techniques. Contests to get you involved in the community to show off your stuff and win valuable prizes. Forums where you can get the answers to your parallel programming questions from Intel engineers and industry experts Blogs where technical opinions and insight are freely shared and discussed often with more energy than you would expect, sometimes we just have to agree to disagree. :) http://software.intel.com/en-us/blogs/category/multi-core/ The site also includes http://software.intel.com/en-us/videos/category/multi-core/1/1/ http://software.intel.com/en-us/multi-core/ |
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20/04/2009 07:36 AM
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OK, so we launched the Xeon 5500 processor based servers and workstations a couple of weeks ago. While I don?t have direct quotes of support from Brit, Miley, Susan or any country presidents who have signed economic stimulus into law I am pretty confident that if they were ever actually considering purchasing a server or workstation they would come to the conclusion that the new Xeon 5500 platforms would be their best choice. I had the privilege of being at one of the thirty seven different worldwide Xeon 5500 launch events. I was on Wall Street and attended the NASDAQ launch event on March 31st. Based on which data source estimate you look at Financial Services as a whole represents about 20% of the worldwide market for servers. It was also evident when meeting with customers in the NYC area that they are passionate about performance and power consumption. Most of them had received pre-production seed systems and had already done extensive testing prior to this launch event. I have been in Intel?s Server Platform Group for over a decade now and I have never seen so much enthusiasm for a product launch. I won?t rehash the performance benchmarks and performance per watt data. There are many benchmarks, blogs and press articles doing that. What I took away from the conversations was a feeling of optimism from the end users I spoke to. Some people felt that these new products would be what it takes for them to deliver solutions that would give them a performance advantage over their competition. In few markets does that pay off more, and translate almost directly to the bottom line, than in Financial Services. Others felt that these systems would help them continue to add to their existing datacenters without having the need to build a new one. This was due to the performance per watt improvements and the end users ability to replace many old servers and workstations with a few new ones. Lastly, I think human nature being what it is we are seeing that IT professionals want to work on cool new projects. These Xeon 5500 servers and workstations represent a shiny new toy that IT professionals can use to have a material impact on the bottom lines of their companies. To some degree the same applies to virtualization in that it is disruptive and provides a new cost effective way to deliver legacy solutions and also enables flexibility for future growth. The IT folks that I have met who familiarize themselves with virtualization, new hardware and advanced management techniques (power, systems, virtualization) generally are viewed internal to their companies as leaders with visionary capabilities. As we all work through this economic morass I am hopeful that with new technology introductions, and a relentless focus on efficiency, we will all emerge with a greater level of capability and a higher degree of flexibility. I also believe IT will emerge as a key asset of differentiation for companies from Wall Street to Main Street and this will place an even greater burden on delivering solutions to meet those unique needs. What do you think? Shannon |
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20/04/2009 06:57 AM
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How PC Gaming helps shape the future of computing One of the reasons I enjoy working in the Games industry so much is due to the rapid pace at which innovation occurs. It?s not uncommon to learn about and be surprised by some new development on a daily basis. I?m going to focus specifically on PC gaming primarily because key advancements and innovations typically seem to occur in PC Games first which then trickles down into other disciplines, fields, or platforms like the Console, Hand Held, MIIDs, etc. My next thought is around just how exploitive PC games are compared to other mainstream consumer software applications. Personally; I?m not sure there is any other software application that taxes a PC?s OS or hardware components to the extent that PC games can. One would likely have to go outside the boundaries of a mainstream software consumer application to find examples of software that even comes close. (e.g. Scientific, Exploration, Climate Modeling, Medical, etc) At a high level PC Games are utilizing: the Graphics stack, the Audio stack, the Network stack, and so on. At a glance here are just some of the key technology features exploited by PC Games: ? Graphics ? PC games typically run thru an API (Application Programming Interface) like DirectX® or OpenGL?, and are fast approaching cinematic quality graphics rendering in real time. While my above list is by no means exhaustive I?m hoping it?s more evident just how many different types of processes are going on inside a PC Game simultaneously. While I don?t expect every non-gaming software application to require or need most of the features listed above, I do believe that most software applications can still benefit from the advances found in PC Gaming that can later translate to: better graphics, better AI, better threading, and so forth. For example, future vision montages like this from Microsoft tend to be pretty feature rich in their vision of graphics utilization. By facing the challenges we find in PC Games today I think we can start realizing some of these visionary goals for the future just that much sooner. I?m curious to hear your thoughts and feedback. (Special thanks to Phil Taylor who helped me with parts of my laundry list, and to a fellow Intel blogger, Doug Holland, who noted the Microsoft Montage) |
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20/04/2009 06:46 AM
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Agile practices have become quite popular amongst software development teams world-wide. Even within Intel, there are many teams starting to adopt and practice Agile in a big way. I am part of one such team and we've been practicing Agile for the last 2 years now and have realized amazingly positive benefits like improved team morale, zero attrition, better customer satisfaction, and much improved quality levels. We've learnt lots of good lessons along the way and have significantly improved our practices maturity. I am also really happy to share that our team just won the prestigious Intel Software Quality Award 2009 (beating 50 other teams) in recogntion of the progress we have made on software quality through Agile practices. I will be sharing some best practices in our Agile adoption in a series of blogs on this site going forward. Since this is a community of software developers, I am hoping there would be good interest in this topic. Stay Tuned. Raj |
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19/04/2009 11:21 PM
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I wanted to quickly share an example of how to set the current power state of a provisioned Intel vPro system using Windows Powershell! Take a moment, and ask yourself these quick questions:Have you ever wanted to be able to automate the powering up, or powering off, of multiple computers?Is your company interested in saving money by not needlessly leaving computers powered on at night?Do you have a time-critical environment, such as a call center, where you need to reliably power up your computers so they are ready to go in the morning for agents?Do you want to be able to create your own helpdesk tools to enable remote reset of hung systems?If you answered "yes" to any of the previous questions, then hopefully this Powershell code will help you, as an administrator, achieve your goals! Let's take a look at how to perform the actions of:Powering up a vPro (AMT) systemPowering down a vPro (AMT) system (not gracefully, just FYI)Power cycling a vPro (AMT) system (also not graceful)For the sake of simplicity, we'll continue to work with the ManageabilityStack.AmtSystem object that I have referenced in my previous article(s). If you aren't sure how to get the $Global:Amtdevice Powershell variable, please look back at my other articles. This will also require the download of the Intel AMT Developer Toolkit. You'll need the Manageability Stack.dll library contained within.-------------------In order to control the remote power state of an AMT system, all you really need to know are these 3 hex values:0x10 = System reset0x11 = Power on0x12 = Power off0x13 = Reset w/ power cycleThese hex values will be used with the $AmtSystem.Remote.SendRemoteControl() method to alter the power state of the remote system. The SendRemoteControl() method included with the DTK includes a number of parameters that go beyond the scope of this article, so we will pass hex value 0x0 to these parameters for the time being. In order to use the above hex values, simply pass the hex value as the first parameter of the SendRemoteControl() method. In order to fulfill the parameter requirements of this method, pass 5 additional parameters with the value 0x0. Here are some examples:Powering up an AMT System$Result = $AmtDevice.Remote.SendRemoteControl(0x11, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0)Write-Host "Power command resulted with: ${Result}"Powering off an AMT System$Result = $AmtDevice.Remote.SendRemoteControl(0x12, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0)Write-Host "Power command resulted with: ${Result}"Power cycling an AMT System$Result = $AmtDevice.Remote.SendRemoteControl(0x10, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0, 0x0)Write-Host "Power command resulted with: ${Result}"The above samples show how to use the SendRemoteControl() method of the AmtRemoteControl type in the Intel AMT Developer Toolkit to control the power state of a remote AMT device.If you have any questions about this, please leave a comment or send me a private message.Sincerely,Trevor SullivanSystems EngineerOfficeMax Corporation |
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19/04/2009 06:25 AM
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Microsoft's Partner Program Website today announced the availability of the Windows 7 Release Candidate. According to the announcement the public availability of the Windows 7 Release Candidate will be May 5th 2009 although MSDN and TechNet Subscribers are able to download the build now. After checking both the MSDN and TechNet subscriber downloads areas it appears that the builds are yet to be uploaded. With the Microsoft TechEd 2009 conference in Los Angeles, CA next month I had personally expected the Windows 7 Release Candidate to be announced during the keynote address. Once the Windows 7 Release Candidate build is available I'll download the build and provide some insight into what the build. It will be interesting to see what, if any, changes are included within the build as there has been some speculation on the blogosphere the RC or RTM builds may contain a new theme. Rafael Rivera, of Within Windows, commented on my previous post and he believes we may indeed see a new theme within the RC or RTM builds to help Microsoft further differentiate the Windows 7 release from Windows Vista. |
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18/04/2009 07:00 PM
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Last year Intel announced the ultra mobile PC using Intel(R) Atom(TM) Processor N270 (1.60GHz) . I commented on its particular incarnation as the Purse PC. I was holding my breath waiting for this to come out. The designer PC is here. I first saw it in a major luxury retailer?s catalog and then in a magazine ad. It is designed by Vivienne Tam and is adorned with large pink and orange chrysanthemums. Men, don?t stop reading here. It?s your chance to buy your significant other a piece of electronic equipment as a gift and get away with it! I am still waiting for one by one of my favorite designers, something that is iridescent black with contrasting corners, or pinstripes, or white on white damask?or?retro. We need variety to create market mass and user identity differentiation. But I think the floral treatment is a good start. It is beautiful. And...for the security minded, who the heck is going to steal this thing from you in an airport? ?Pardon me, I believe that is my Vivienne Tam PC you are carrying underneath your trenchcoat. I am sure it was just a mistake that you confused it with your black standard-sized notebook.? The ideal theft-proofing will be the DIY design-your-own PC skin at the vendor website, using a host of design elements and color, spray paint effects, etc., all baked in of course. That screams: ?This is not my Dad!? via remote control. You saw it here. Next question: what are people putting on their purse PCs. I have to know! And what is the demographic? Click for some clues. The purse PC does have a matching carrying case, and couture dress, if you can afford it. But I notice that on another site someone complained that there was no mirror on it. Possible new graphics app: Mirrorware. Hmmm. |
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17/04/2009 01:05 PM
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