Qubes users will be always vulnerable to microcode issues

[TNTBOMBOM]

How to file a helpful issue

Qubes OS release

4.1

Brief summary

Qubes dom0 whether its 4.1 , 4.0.. were always vulnerable to some of spectre/meltdown issues due to the outdated micrcode package in fedora-dom0

Steps to reproduce

• Open dom0 terminal
• Install spectre-meltdown-checker
• Run sudo spectre-meltdown-checker --paranoid ; echo $?

Also check microcode_ctl in dom0/fedora 32 VS fedora 34,or 35 (outdated)

Expected behavior

Microcode package must be updated to the stable fedora version

Actual behavior

[user@dom0 ~]$ sudo spectre-meltdown-checker --paranoid ; echo $?
Spectre and Meltdown mitigation detection tool v0.44

Checking for vulnerabilities on current system
Kernel is Linux 5.10.90-1.fc32.qubes.x86_64 #1 SMP Thu Jan 13 20:46:58 CET 2022 x86_64
CPU is Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4710HQ CPU @ 2.50GHz

Hardware check
* Hardware support (CPU microcode) for mitigation techniques
  * Indirect Branch Restricted Speculation (IBRS)
    * SPEC_CTRL MSR is available:  YES 
    * CPU indicates IBRS capability:  YES  (SPEC_CTRL feature bit)
  * Indirect Branch Prediction Barrier (IBPB)
    * PRED_CMD MSR is available:  YES 
    * CPU indicates IBPB capability:  YES  (SPEC_CTRL feature bit)
  * Single Thread Indirect Branch Predictors (STIBP)
    * SPEC_CTRL MSR is available:  YES 
    * CPU indicates STIBP capability:  YES  (Intel STIBP feature bit)
  * Speculative Store Bypass Disable (SSBD)
    * CPU indicates SSBD capability:  YES  (Intel SSBD)
  * L1 data cache invalidation
    * FLUSH_CMD MSR is available:  NO 
    * CPU indicates L1D flush capability:  NO 
  * Microarchitectural Data Sampling
    * VERW instruction is available:  YES  (MD_CLEAR feature bit)
  * Enhanced IBRS (IBRS_ALL)
    * CPU indicates ARCH_CAPABILITIES MSR availability:  NO 
    * ARCH_CAPABILITIES MSR advertises IBRS_ALL capability:  NO 
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to Meltdown/L1TF (RDCL_NO):  NO 
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to Variant 4 (SSB_NO):  NO 
  * CPU/Hypervisor indicates L1D flushing is not necessary on this system:  NO 
  * Hypervisor indicates host CPU might be vulnerable to RSB underflow (RSBA):  NO 
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to Microarchitectural Data Sampling (MDS_NO):  NO 
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to TSX Asynchronous Abort (TAA_NO):  NO 
  * CPU explicitly indicates not being vulnerable to iTLB Multihit (PSCHANGE_MSC_NO):  NO 
  * CPU explicitly indicates having MSR for TSX control (TSX_CTRL_MSR):  NO 
  * CPU supports Transactional Synchronization Extensions (TSX):  NO 
  * CPU supports Software Guard Extensions (SGX):  NO 
  * CPU supports Special Register Buffer Data Sampling (SRBDS):  NO 
  * CPU microcode is known to cause stability problems:  NO  (family 0x6 model 0x3c stepping 0x3 ucode 0x28 cpuid 0x306c3)
  * CPU microcode is the latest known available version:  YES  (latest version is 0x28 dated 2019/11/12 according to builtin firmwares DB v165.20201021+i20200616)
* CPU vulnerability to the speculative execution attack variants
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2017-5753 (Spectre Variant 1, bounds check bypass):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2017-5715 (Spectre Variant 2, branch target injection):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2017-5754 (Variant 3, Meltdown, rogue data cache load):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-3640 (Variant 3a, rogue system register read):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-3639 (Variant 4, speculative store bypass):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-3615 (Foreshadow (SGX), L1 terminal fault):  NO 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-3620 (Foreshadow-NG (OS), L1 terminal fault):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-3646 (Foreshadow-NG (VMM), L1 terminal fault):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-12126 (Fallout, microarchitectural store buffer data sampling (MSBDS)):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-12130 (ZombieLoad, microarchitectural fill buffer data sampling (MFBDS)):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-12127 (RIDL, microarchitectural load port data sampling (MLPDS)):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2019-11091 (RIDL, microarchitectural data sampling uncacheable memory (MDSUM)):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2019-11135 (ZombieLoad V2, TSX Asynchronous Abort (TAA)):  NO 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2018-12207 (No eXcuses, iTLB Multihit, machine check exception on page size changes (MCEPSC)):  YES 
  * Vulnerable to CVE-2020-0543 (Special Register Buffer Data Sampling (SRBDS)):  YES 

CVE-2017-5753 aka 'Spectre Variant 1, bounds check bypass'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization)
* Kernel has array_index_mask_nospec:  YES  (1 occurrence(s) found of x86 64 bits array_index_mask_nospec())
* Kernel has the Red Hat/Ubuntu patch:  NO 
* Kernel has mask_nospec64 (arm64):  NO 
* Kernel has array_index_nospec (arm64):  NO 
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Mitigation: usercopy/swapgs barriers and __user pointer sanitization)

CVE-2017-5715 aka 'Spectre Variant 2, branch target injection'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Full generic retpoline, IBPB: conditional, IBRS_FW, STIBP: conditional, RSB filling)
* Mitigation 1
  * Kernel is compiled with IBRS support:  YES 
    * IBRS enabled and active:  YES  (for firmware code only)
  * Kernel is compiled with IBPB support:  YES 
    * IBPB enabled and active:  YES 
* Mitigation 2
  * Kernel has branch predictor hardening (arm):  NO 
  * Kernel compiled with retpoline option:  YES 
    * Kernel compiled with a retpoline-aware compiler:  YES  (kernel reports full retpoline compilation)
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Full retpoline + IBPB are mitigating the vulnerability)

CVE-2017-5754 aka 'Variant 3, Meltdown, rogue data cache load'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  UNKNOWN  (Unknown (XEN PV detected, hypervisor mitigation required))
* Kernel supports Page Table Isolation (PTI):  YES 
  * PTI enabled and active: dmesg truncated, Xen detection will be unreliable. Please reboot and relaunch this script
 UNKNOWN  (dmesg truncated, please reboot and relaunch this script)
  * Reduced performance impact of PTI:  NO  (PCID/INVPCID not supported, performance impact of PTI will be significant)
dmesg truncated, Xen detection will be unreliable. Please reboot and relaunch this script
dmesg truncated, Xen detection will be unreliable. Please reboot and relaunch this script
* Running as a Xen PV DomU:  NO 
> STATUS:  UNKNOWN  (Unknown (XEN PV detected, hypervisor mitigation required))

CVE-2018-3640 aka 'Variant 3a, rogue system register read'
* CPU microcode mitigates the vulnerability:  YES 
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (your CPU microcode mitigates the vulnerability)

CVE-2018-3639 aka 'Variant 4, speculative store bypass'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp)
* Kernel supports disabling speculative store bypass (SSB):  YES  (found in /proc/self/status)
* SSB mitigation is enabled and active:  YES  (per-thread through prctl)
* SSB mitigation currently active for selected processes:  YES  (dbus-broker dbus-broker-launch gsettings-helper pulseaudio systemd-homed systemd-journald systemd-logind systemd-udevd systemd-userdbd systemd-userwork upowerd)
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Mitigation: Speculative Store Bypass disabled via prctl and seccomp)

CVE-2018-3615 aka 'Foreshadow (SGX), L1 terminal fault'
* CPU microcode mitigates the vulnerability:  N/A 
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (your CPU vendor reported your CPU model as not vulnerable)

CVE-2018-3620 aka 'Foreshadow-NG (OS), L1 terminal fault'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: PTE Inversion)
* Kernel supports PTE inversion:  YES  (found in kernel image)
* PTE inversion enabled and active:  YES 
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (Mitigation: PTE Inversion)

CVE-2018-3646 aka 'Foreshadow-NG (VMM), L1 terminal fault'
* Information from the /sys interface: Mitigation: PTE Inversion
* This system is a host running a hypervisor:  YES  (paranoid mode)
* Mitigation 1 (KVM)
  * EPT is disabled:  N/A  (the kvm_intel module is not loaded)
* Mitigation 2
  * L1D flush is supported by kernel:  YES  (found flush_l1d in kernel image)
  * L1D flush enabled: dmesg truncated, Xen detection will be unreliable. Please reboot and relaunch this script
 UNKNOWN  (unrecognized mode)
  * Hardware-backed L1D flush supported:  NO  (flush will be done in software, this is slower)
  * Hyper-Threading (SMT) is enabled:  YES 
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (enable L1D unconditional flushing and disable Hyper-Threading to fully mitigate the vulnerability)

CVE-2018-12126 aka 'Fallout, microarchitectural store buffer data sampling (MSBDS)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT Host state unknown)
* Kernel supports using MD_CLEAR mitigation:  YES  (md_clear found in /proc/cpuinfo)
* Kernel mitigation is enabled and active:  YES 
* SMT is either mitigated or disabled:  NO 
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (Your microcode and kernel are both up to date for this mitigation, but you must disable SMT (Hyper-Threading) for a complete mitigation)

CVE-2018-12130 aka 'ZombieLoad, microarchitectural fill buffer data sampling (MFBDS)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT Host state unknown)
* Kernel supports using MD_CLEAR mitigation:  YES  (md_clear found in /proc/cpuinfo)
* Kernel mitigation is enabled and active:  YES 
* SMT is either mitigated or disabled:  NO 
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (Your microcode and kernel are both up to date for this mitigation, but you must disable SMT (Hyper-Threading) for a complete mitigation)

CVE-2018-12127 aka 'RIDL, microarchitectural load port data sampling (MLPDS)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT Host state unknown)
* Kernel supports using MD_CLEAR mitigation:  YES  (md_clear found in /proc/cpuinfo)
* Kernel mitigation is enabled and active:  YES 
* SMT is either mitigated or disabled:  NO 
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (Your microcode and kernel are both up to date for this mitigation, but you must disable SMT (Hyper-Threading) for a complete mitigation)

CVE-2019-11091 aka 'RIDL, microarchitectural data sampling uncacheable memory (MDSUM)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Mitigation: Clear CPU buffers; SMT Host state unknown)
* Kernel supports using MD_CLEAR mitigation:  YES  (md_clear found in /proc/cpuinfo)
* Kernel mitigation is enabled and active:  YES 
* SMT is either mitigated or disabled:  NO 
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (Your microcode and kernel are both up to date for this mitigation, but you must disable SMT (Hyper-Threading) for a complete mitigation)

CVE-2019-11135 aka 'ZombieLoad V2, TSX Asynchronous Abort (TAA)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (Not affected)
* TAA mitigation is supported by kernel:  YES  (found tsx_async_abort in kernel image)
* TAA mitigation enabled and active:  NO 
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (your CPU vendor reported your CPU model as not vulnerable)

CVE-2018-12207 aka 'No eXcuses, iTLB Multihit, machine check exception on page size changes (MCEPSC)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  YES  (KVM: Mitigation: VMX unsupported)
* This system is a host running a hypervisor:  YES  (paranoid mode)
* iTLB Multihit mitigation is supported by kernel:  YES  (found itlb_multihit in kernel image)
* iTLB Multihit mitigation enabled and active:  YES  (KVM: Mitigation: VMX unsupported)
> STATUS:  NOT VULNERABLE  (KVM: Mitigation: VMX unsupported)

CVE-2020-0543 aka 'Special Register Buffer Data Sampling (SRBDS)'
* Mitigated according to the /sys interface:  UNKNOWN  (Unknown: Dependent on hypervisor status)
* SRBDS mitigation control is supported by the kernel:  YES  (found SRBDS implementation evidence in kernel image. Your kernel is up to date for SRBDS mitigation)
* SRBDS mitigation control is enabled and active:  NO 
> STATUS:  VULNERABLE  (Your CPU microcode may need to be updated to mitigate the vulnerability)

> SUMMARY: CVE-2017-5753:OK CVE-2017-5715:OK CVE-2017-5754:?? CVE-2018-3640:OK CVE-2018-3639:OK CVE-2018-3615:OK CVE-2018-3620:OK CVE-2018-3646:KO CVE-2018-12126:KO CVE-2018-12130:KO CVE-2018-12127:KO CVE-2019-11091:KO CVE-2019-11135:OK CVE-2018-12207:OK CVE-2020-0543:KO

Need more detailed information about mitigation options? Use --explain
A false sense of security is worse than no security at all, see --disclaimer
2
[user@dom0 ~]$ 

And current microcode package in dom0 is:

[user@dom0 ~]$ dnf list | grep microcode_ctl
microcode_ctl.x86_64                         3:2.1-33.qubes1.fc32             @anaconda         

But in fedora 34 is microcode_ctl-2.1-46.fc34

Related issues:

4262 #6982

[rustybird]

Qubes dom0 whether its 4.1 , 4.0.. were always vulnerable to some of spectre/meltdown issues due to the outdated micrcode package in fedora-dom0

No, Qubes provides its own up-to-date microcode package. Right now the latest version (20220207 / 2.1-34.qubes1) is in current-testing:

https://github.com/QubesOS/updates-status/issues/2813 https://github.com/QubesOS/updates-status/issues/2814

And current microcode package in dom0 is:

[user@dom0 ~]$ dnf list | grep microcode_ctl
microcode_ctl.x86_64                         3:2.1-33.qubes1.fc32             @anaconda         

But in fedora 34 is microcode_ctl-2.1-46.fc34

It's a different versioning scheme than the one used by Fedora, so the two versions cannot be compared to each other.