papers

Igor Skochinsky (of IDA Hex-Rays fame, among others) has been studying Intel ME for quite some time. He gave a nice talk at Breakpoint summarizing what he'd discovered (slides here [pdf]: https://github.com/skochinsky/papers/blob/master/2014-10%20%...). Among other things, he finds that ME is capable of running signed Java code which is pushed to the device. Due to the complexity and size of the Java code, it's quite likely to have bugs. ME is a bit scary partly because it's a totally closed-source and proprietary component of your computer with full and essentially unfettered access to everything - RAM, peripherals, and network I/O. Any bug in a publicly-accessible component would have the potential to do serious damage. For example, a bug in the network stack might make it possible for attackers to remotely own your box.

If anyone feels like researching this, don't look at the BadBios conspiracy, that's an internet meme. Instead look at things like Intel's trusted computing. Igor Skochinsky (of fame from Hexrays / IDA, and moderator on /r/reverseengineering) has an excellent powerpoint highlighting some research on their Management Engine, which is probably in your computer right now. pdf: https://github.com/skochinsky/papers/raw/master/2014-10%20%5...