Recently, some security researchers found out a number of serious vulnerabilities in the Intel processors. Intel researchers also looked into the matter and confirmed the vulnerabilities giving them a code INTEL-SA-00086. The identified security vulnerabilities could be very risky for a system using the Intel processors. One of these vulnerabilities allows a potential attacker to remotely execute code and take control of your computer without your knowledge. The security holes exist in the CPU firmware, therefore even an update system will be vulnerable to the attacks.
As a result of the finding of their research, Intel has released a few tools that allow you to easily identify whether your PC running Intel processor is vulnerable to the INTEL-SA-00086. You can download these tools from the Intel’s website and use them in your computer to find if your system is vulnerable or not. The tools are available for Linux and Windows only.
The Windows version comes in two flavors – a GUI version and a CLI version. The GUI version is easier to use but if you want to check multiple computers on a network, then perhaps you would like to use the CLI version. As soon as you launch the Intel-SA-00086-GUI.exe program, it starts to scan your system to check the firmware version of the CPU. In a few seconds, the results will be on your screen.
For my Lenovo Ideapad notebook computer, it showed “This system is not vulnerable” message. Therefore, I had nothing else to do in order to protect my PC. But if your PC displays the bad news (your system is vulnerable), then you can wait a few days or months for the OEM manufacturer to release the updates. The large scale PC manufacturers like HP and Lenovo have already started working on the updating of the patches.
You can download INTEL-SA-00086 tool from https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/27150.