USN-3690-2: AMD Microcode regression

5 July 2018

The system could be made to expose sensitive information.

Reduce your security exposure

Ubuntu Pro provides ten-year security coverage to 25,000+ packages in Main and Universe repositories, and it is free for up to five machines.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Releases

Packages

Details

USN-3690-1 provided updated microcode for AMD processors to address
CVE-2017-5715 (aka Spectre). Unfortunately, the update caused some
systems to fail to boot. This update reverts the update for Ubuntu
14.04 LTS.

We apologize for the inconvenience.

Original advisory details:

Jann Horn discovered that microprocessors utilizing speculative execution
and branch prediction may allow unauthorized memory reads via sidechannel
attacks. This flaw is known as Spectre. A local attacker could use this to
expose sensitive information, including kernel memory.

This update provides the microcode updates for AMD 17H family
processors required for the corresponding Linux kernel updates.

Reduce your security exposure

Ubuntu Pro provides ten-year security coverage to 25,000+ packages in Main and Universe repositories, and it is free for up to five machines.

Learn more about Ubuntu Pro

Update instructions

The problem can be corrected by updating your system to the following package versions:

Ubuntu 14.04

After a standard system update you need to reboot your computer to make
all the necessary changes.

References

Join the discussion

Need help with your security needs?

Ubuntu Pro provides up to ten-year security coverage for over 23,000 open-source packages within the Ubuntu Main and Universe repositories.

Talk to an expert to find out what would work best for you

Further reading