The latest security information on Intel® products.

Summary:

A potential security vulnerability in Intel® Boot Guard and Intel® Trusted Execution Technology (TXT) for some Intel® processors may allow escalation of privilege. Intel is releasing firmware updates and prescriptive guidance to mitigate this potential vulnerability.

Vulnerability Details:

CVEID: CVE-2022-0004

Description: Hardware debug modes and processor INIT setting that allow override of locks for some Intel(R) Processors in Intel(R) Boot Guard and Intel(R) TXT may allow an unauthenticated user to potentially enable escalation of privilege via physical access.

CVSS Base Score: 7.3 High

CVSS Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:P/AC:L/PR:N/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N (Physical, unauthenticated)

CVSS Base Score: 7.3 High

CVSS Vector: CVSS:3.1/AV:A/AC:H/PR:H/UI:N/S:C/C:H/I:H/A:N (Adjacent network, authenticated)

Affected Products:

10th Gen Intel® Core™ processor

11th Gen Intel® Core™ processor

12th Gen Intel® Core™ processor

8th Gen Intel® Core™ processor

Celeron® processor 4000 series

Celeron® processor 6000 series

Celeron® processor J3000/N3000 series

Celeron® processor J4000/N4000 series

Celeron® processor N series

Intel Atom® processor P5000 series

Intel Atom® processor X E3900 series

Intel Atom® x6000E series

Intel Pentium® and Celeron® N and J Series processors

Intel® 100 series chipset

Intel® 200 series chipset

Intel® 300 series chipset

Intel® 400 series chipset

Intel® 500 series chipset

Intel® C230 series chipset

Intel® C240 series chipset

Intel® C250 Series chipset

Intel® C420 chipset

Intel® C620 series chipset

Intel® C620A series chipset

Intel® Core™ i5 L16G7 and Intel® Core™ i3 L13G4

Intel® Pentium® processor J4000/N4000 series

Intel® Pentium® processor J5000/N5000 series

Intel® X299 chipset

Intel® Xeon® D processor 2000 series

Intel® Xeon® W processor 1300 series

Pentium® Gold processor series

Pentium® Gold processor series (G54XXU)

Pentium® Silver processor series

Recommendations:

Intel recommends updating Intel® CSME to the latest version (see provided table).

Intel also recommends following the previously published guidance on disabling the CPU Debug feature when Intel® Boot Guard is enabled. Please consult this Intel Debug paper for more details.

Intel also recommends disabling the BSP (Bootstrap Processor) INIT (DBI) bit to enable protections against an INIT bypassing the startup Authenticated Code Module (ACM). This setting change is available in the latest version of Intel® CSME.

Intel recommends that users of Intel® CSME update to the latest version provided by the system manufacturer that addresses these issues.

Prescriptive guidance: Intel is not releasing updated Intel® SPS firmware to disable the CPU debug feature on server products.

Intel recommends users follow existing security best practices and alternate security controls, including:

· Ensure physical security of server systems, and secure BMC access if BMC has adjacent-network JTAG access.

Acknowledgements:

The following issue was found internally by Intel employees. Intel would like to thank Ki W Yoon.

Subsequently, this issue was reported by Mickey Shkatov. Intel would like to thank Mickey Shkatov from Eclypsium for reporting this issue.

Intel, and nearly the entire technology industry, follows a disclosure practice called Coordinated Disclosure, under which a cybersecurity vulnerability is generally publicly disclosed only after mitigations are available.