I skimmed the paper and while the research looks solid, just in terms of the digging they did and the documentation they're providing, this website <i>really</i> buries its lede: if you've got a Macbook running macOS, the Macbook IOMMU breaks the DMA attack, which is the thing you're actually worried about here.<p>Additionally, regardless of the OS you run, Macbooks aren't affected by the Security Level/SPI flash hacks they came up with to disable Thunderbolt security.
> there is no malicious piece of hardware that the attacker tricks you into using<p>> All the attacker needs is 5 minutes alone with the computer, a screwdriver, and some easily portable hardware.<p>Just started reading, but the comparison is already a little bizarre. It almost seems like the digital version of "This murderer is on the loose and you're in danger! He doesn't need to inject poison into your food. All he needs is just 5 minutes in front of you with a knife!"
This is the kind of garbage that the infosec community often memes about. A marketing website, a domain name, a cute logo for a vanity project masquerading as security research. Basically every one of the "seven" vulnerabilities boils down to "if someone can flash the SPI of the thunderbolt controller then xxx" but if they can flash the TB SPI, then they can also flash the BIOS SPI which has a lot of the same "vulnerabilities" but arguably is more impactful. The reason they only mentioned TB is because the BIOS stuff is well known and you can't put your name on it.<p>Let's break down each of the "vulnerability".<p>1. "However, we have found authenticity is not verified at boot time, upon connecting the device, or at any later point." This is actually false. Like, the author either didn't experiment properly or is lying/purposely misleading you. The firmware IS verified at boot for Alpine Ridge and Titan Ridge (Intel's TB3 controllers). They aren't for older controllers which does NOT support TB3. When verification fails, the controller falls back into a "safe mode" which does NOT run the firmware code for any of the ARC processors in the Ridge controller (there are a handful of processors where the firmware contains compressed code for). I'm willing to bet the author did not manage to reverse engineer the proprietary Huffman compression the firmware uses and therefore couldn't have loaded their own firmware. Because if they did, it wouldn't have worked. Now the RSA signature verification scheme they use to verify the firmware does suffer from some weaknesses but afaik doesn't lead to arbitrary code execution (on any of the Ridge ARC processors). I would love to be proven wrong here with real evidence though ;)<p>2. Basically the string identifiers inside the firmware isn't signed/verified. This has no security implications beyond you can spoof identifiers and make the string "pwned" appear in system details when you plug the device in and authenticate it. Basically if you've ever developed custom USB devices you can see how silly this is as a "vulnerability."<p>3. This is literally the same as #2.<p>4. Yes, TB2 is vulnerable to many DMA attacks as demonstrated in the past. Yes, TB3 has a TB2 compatibility mode. Yes, that means the same vulnerabilities exist in compatibility mode which is why you can disable it.<p>5. This one is technically true. If you open the case up, and flash the SPI chip containing the TB3 firmware, you can patch the security level set in BIOS and do stuff like re-enable TB2 if the user disabled it. But if I were the attacker, I would instead look at the SPI chip right next to it containing the UEFI firmware and NVRAM variables (most of which aren't signed/encryption in any modern PC).<p>6. SPI chips have interfaces for writing, erasing, and locking. If you have direct access to the chip you can abuse these pins to permanently brick the device. Here's another way: take your screwdriver and jam it into the computer.<p>7. Apple does not enable TB3 security features on Boot Camp. I guess this one is vaguely the only real "vulnerability" although it's well known and Apple doesn't care much about Windows security anyways (they don't enable Intel Boot Guard or BIOS Guard or TPM or any other Intel/Microsoft security feature).<p>Not that it matters but my personal experience with TB3 is that I've done significant reverse engineering of the Ridge controllers for the Hackintosh community.
What would it take to have a Thunderbolt/USB C condom? You know, like those standard USB adapter that just drops the data leads on a usb charger to make attacks like this impossible. Maybe we would have to implement a hardware switch on the device itself?<p>I'm not going to feel safe charging with a public use charger until I find some way to insure only power and not data is making it to my device. Even POE feels like it's safer than modern peripheral standards right now.<p>(I admit this might not be perfectly linked to the article, it's just a need I've felt for a while but I can't seem to buy a solution for.)
I wonder if that could be used by used sellers of MacBooks to get into the computers.<p><a href="https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/akw558/apples-t2-security-chip-has-created-a-nightmare-for-macbook-refurbishers" rel="nofollow">https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/akw558/apples-t2-security...</a><p>I guess MacBook resellers sometimes get computers where the password has been set and they can't get into the computers. I imagine they would be motivated to find anyway they can to unlock the computers.
There is a nice write-up about this on attackerkb. If you're not familiar with it it's a community to provide assessments of vulnerabilities and point out which are worth stopping everything to patch and which are mostly harmless.
It's currently in open beta.
Main site: <a href="https://attackerkb.com/" rel="nofollow">https://attackerkb.com/</a>
Thunderspy assessment: <a href="https://attackerkb.com/topics/mPaHZgsUvk/thunderspy" rel="nofollow">https://attackerkb.com/topics/mPaHZgsUvk/thunderspy</a>
There were news sometime ago that Microsoft did not include thunderbolt in their surface 3 because it was insecure. I wonder if that's related to this and whether Microsoft knew about this for a while.
> Contrary to USB, Thunderbolt is a proprietary connectivity standard. Device vendors are required to apply for Intel’s Thunderbolt developer program, in order to obtain access to protocol specifications and the Thunderbolt hardware supply chain. In addition, devices are subject to certification procedures before being admitted to the Thunderbolt ecosystem.<p>I thought that this had changed with USB-C?!
Easy read on the Wired magazine:
<a href="https://www.wired.com/story/thunderspy-thunderbolt-evil-maid-hacking/" rel="nofollow">https://www.wired.com/story/thunderspy-thunderbolt-evil-maid...</a>
This video shows the POC demo:
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uvSZA1F9os" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uvSZA1F9os</a>
Really though, if an attacker has unencumbered access to one’s device, all security goes flying out the window.<p>The website is highly self-promoting.