Beware the risks of cyberattacks on your computer hardware.
Most people think of cyberattacks as software against software – traditional malware such as Trojans, viruses, and worms infiltrating and attacking applications, operating systems, or data. This arms race has been escalating for decades and is now at a high level of sophistication, requiring advanced skills on both sides.
But there is another type of attack, one that pits software against hardware. These attacks typically try to corrupt the firmware or configurations used by processors or other core components. Attacking hardware or firmware enables an adversary to have enhanced abilities to hide from detection and can also increase damage to a platform, such as preventing the machine from booting. This can render the machine unusable and unrecoverable with the tools available in an average IT department. Since the machine would not be able to get as far as initializing the memory or external interfaces, even an external drive would not be able to boot.
