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Introduction

Since January 2018, the Surface team has been publishing firmware updates for a class of silicon-based issues that involve microarchitectural and speculative execution side-channel vulnerabilities. The Surface team continues to work closely with the Windows team and industry partners to protect customers. To get all available protection, both firmware and Windows system updates are required.

Summary

The Surface team is aware of new silicon-based microarchitectural and speculative execution side-channel attack variants that also affect Surface products. For more information about the vulnerabilities and mitigations, see the following security advisory: 

We are working together with our partners to provide updates to Surface products as soon as we can make sure the updates meet our quality requirements. 

For more information about updates for Surface devices, see Surface update history.

The Surface team is aware of new speculative execution side-channel attack variants that also affect Surface products. Mitigation of those vulnerabilities requires an operating system update and a Surface UEFI update that includes new microcode. For more information about the vulnerabilities and mitigations, see the following security advisory:

In addition to installing the Windows Operating System security updates, Surface has released UEFI updates through Windows Update and the Download Center for the following devices:

In addition to the new microcode, a new UEFI setting that is known as “Simultaneous Multi-Threading (SMT)” will be available when the UEFI update is installed. This setting allows a user to disable Hyper-Threading.

Notes

  • If you decide to disable Hyper-Threading, we recommend that you use the new SMT UEFI setting.

  • Disabling SMT provides additional protection against these new vulnerabilities and the L1 Terminal Fault attack that was announced earlier. However, this method also affects the performance of the device.

  • Surface 3 and Surface Studio with Intel Core i5 do not have SMT. Therefore, those devices do not have this new setting.

  • The Microsoft Surface Enterprise Management Mode (SEMM) UEFI configurator tool version 2.43.139 or later supports the new SMT setting. The tools can be downloaded from this webpage. Download the following required tools:

    • SurfaceUEFI_Configurator_v2.43.139.0.msi

    • SurfaceUEFI_Manager_v2.43.139.0.msi

The Surface team is aware of a new speculative execution side-channel attack called L1 Terminal Fault (L1TF) and assigned CVE-2018-3620 (OS and SMM) and CVE-2018-3646 (VMM). Affected Surface products are the same as in the “Vulnerabilities Announced in May 2018” section of this article. The microcode updates that mitigate the May 2018 findings also mitigate L1TF (CVE-2018-3646). For more information about the vulnerability and mitigations, see the following security advisory:

The security advisory proposes that customers who are using Virtualization Based Security (VBS), which includes security features such as Credential Guard and Device Guard, should consider disabling Hyper-Threading in order to fully eliminate the risk from L1TF.

The Surface team has become aware of new speculative execution side-channel attack variants that also affect Surface products. Mitigation of those vulnerabilities requires UEFI updates that use new microcode. For more information about the vulnerabilities and mitigations, see the following security advisories:

In addition to installing the Windows Operating System security updates, Surface has released UEFI updates through Windows Update and the Download Center for the following devices:

The Surface team is aware of the publicly disclosed class of vulnerabilities that involve speculative execution side-channel (known as Spectre and Meltdown) that affect many modern processors and operating systems, including Intel, AMD, and ARM. For more information about the vulnerabilities and mitigations, see the following security advisory:

For more information about Windows software updates, see the following knowledge base articles:

In addition to installing the January 3 Windows Operating System Security Updates, Surface has released UEFI updates through Windows Update and the Download Center for the following devices:

These updates are available for devices that are running Windows 10 Creators Update (build 15063) and later versions.

More information

The Surface Hub operating system, Windows 10 Team, has implemented defense-in-depth strategies. Because of this, we believe that exploits that use these vulnerabilities are significantly reduced on Surface Hub when running Windows 10 Team operating system.  For more information, see the following topic on the Windows IT Pro Center website: Differences between Surface Hub and Windows 10 Enterprise.  

The Surface team is focused on making sure that our users have a secure and reliable experience. We will continue to monitor and update devices as required to address these vulnerabilities and keep the devices reliable and secure.

References

We provide third-party contact information to help you find technical support. This contact information may change without notice. We do not guarantee the accuracy of this third-party contact information.

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