For the 3 bugs, the biggest one only affect Intel CPUs, for bug 2 and 3:
AMD bug only affects THE SAME PROCESS, unlike Intel, which allows exploits to cross processes:
https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.com/2018/01/reading-privi...
"As shown, AMD was only vulnerable to "the ability to read data inside mis-speculated execution within the same process, without crossing any privilege boundaries."
To me, the 'biggest' problem here is Spectre which affects all modern high-performance processors, regardless of make or model due to it being a failure of a fundamental technique used to create them.
The Meltdown bug is not more serious than Spectre, if anything, its the reverse as Meltdown has a realistic mitigation.
I see no attempt by Intel to minimise this as it quite clearly is an industry-wide problem, don't start looking for scapegoats where there is none.
There isn't always someone at fault.
The "worse" part of Spectre is mainly about the fact that it affects everyone (but not to the same degree). But on a per chip-maker basis, Intel is still getting the shortest end of the stick here.
Spectre style issues had JS pulling browser process memory using timing--the patches being "put every page in its own process" (Chrome) and "don't let people get accurate timings" (Firefox). They are way worse in the grand scheme of things, because even if they aren't as easy to exploit, they will continue to show up, probably for the foreseeable future (next 5-10 years), long after Meltdown is patched and old news.
Of course every website needs it's own process. It should really be in it's own VM too.
Does all this create an opportunity for another chip line (architecture) to capture some of the server market?
I'm thinking specifically of SPARC. How far behind is SPARC now? A decade? Is that gap surmountable?
Given that 1) both AMD and Intel have issues, and 2) the commentariat have written the variety of ARMs are a mess too, and 3) maybe the people who care (those with server farms) will mitigate risks by adding a completely different architecture to the mix (prefer hetero vs mono culture).
Just curious.
Also, it is unclear whether it allows speculation beyond privilege boundaries and it is also unclear whether ordering semantics for memory are different enough to mitigate somewhat.
I wish I still had access to modern sparc hardware to find out.
While it’s best to assume everything is vulnerable unless proven otherwise I’d really like to see a thorough evaluation.
In the Meltdown paper, the authors report that they couldn't yet make the proof-of-concept exploit work on AMD or ARM, despite having confirmed the general vulnerability on those processors. So based on current knowledge, AMD and ARM are vulnerable to Meltdown with quite a high probability.
The current PoC created by the researchers doesn't work on other manufacturer's CPU's, but the vulnerability and the Meltdown class of attacks should work on other manufacturer's CPUs. Or at least we don't know any reason it shouldn't. The authors' "toy example" works on AMD and ARM too. (See the section 6.4 in the paper).