Intel's Core 2 Duo processor has “serious, exploitable” bugs, claims Open BSD founder Theo de Raadt. Posting on a mailing list, de Raadt further charges that Intel leaves open source operating systems “in the cold” when it comes to providing fixes.

In his post, de Raadt says that “Intel understates the impact of these erraata [sic] very significantly. Almost all operating systems will run into these bugs.” But an Intel spokesperson, quoted by ExtremeTech, responds that “Intel has a well-known errata communication process to inform our customers and the public … the probability of encountering this issue is low.”

Intel provides an ongoing list of errata for the Core 2 Duo CPU (direct link to PDF file). In his post, de Raadt writes, “hiding in this (errata) list are 20-30 bugs that cannot be worked around by operating systems, and will be potentially exploitable.”

BIOS vendors will be very late providing providing workarounds or fixes for these bugs, de Raadt alleges. “I cannot recommend purchase of any machines based on the Intel Core 2 until these issues are dealt with,” says de Raadt.

He added, “Intel must become more transparent.”

For more information, read the complete ExtremeTech article.

 
This article was originally published on LinuxDevices.com and has been donated to the open source community by QuinStreet Inc. Please visit LinuxToday.com for up-to-date news and articles about Linux and open source.