Published on FierceCIO:TechWatch (http://www.fiercecio.com/techwatch)
August 2, 2013 | By Paul Mah
Security researchers at Black Hat demonstrated a couple of ways in which they were able to circumvent the Secure Boot feature in Windows 8 to install a boot rootkit on a Unified Extensible Firmware Interface equipped computer.
The first exploit was demonstrated on an Asus VivoBook Q200E laptop, though it requires the code to be executed in kernel mode on the targeted computer. As this is the most privileged part of the operating system, the difficulty is greatly increased.
The second exploit demonstrated by the researchers is more problematic, as it could be run in user mode. This means that hackers would only need to find vulnerabilities in regular apps to pull off their attack. No technical details were offered on this front, as the flaw was only recently discovered.
That Secure Boot could be corrupted is bad news considering it was designed precisely to defend against installing malware at the pre-OS environment by corrupting the boot loader. According to the researchers, the exploits work not because of vulnerabilities inherent in Secure Boot, but because of implementation errors made by platform vendors.
The Fierce Take: Despite some implementation vulnerabilities in Secure Boot, it should be noted that it remains a substantial barrier to hackers looking to attack the boot sector of PCs. Ultimately, Secure Boot is another reason for enterprises to make the switch to Windows 8 with a new UEFI-equipped PC.
