Re:Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler
by mike_hearn on Monday May 11, 2026 @10:32AM
(#48095528)
Spectre doesn't work across process boundaries, so I don't think they are. You can't Spectre your way into a banking app on an iPhone. Or if you can I'd like to see it in action.
I believe "Spectre" is an ever-growing series of ways to read the memory contents of another process by abusing a CPU's ability to do speculative execution. It's unlikely that a CPU will be available in the near-term that's immune to it, so the only sure fix is to use air-gapping. So in principle, your suggestion is vulnerable. Alternatively, the problem may be academic. There is a still-growing class of Spectre attacks, so it's hard to know how flawed your comment was.
Re:Hardware Attestation as Monopoly Enabler
by mike_hearn on Tuesday May 12, 2026 @04:57AM
(#48105846)
The only similar bug I'm aware of was Meltdown, an Intel only bug that was immediately patched with a microcode update. But Meltdown was a different bug to Spectre. Spectre is a class of attacks that's hard to solve by design, Meltdown was a specific bug that was easy to solve.
> Smartphone HW attestation is better in every way
They're still prone to side-channel attacks like SPECTRE. Crypto wallets are practically immune because they're air-gapped.
[edit] I just realised that's Mike Hearn of early BTC fame. I suppose he would know what a crypto wallet is.