Intel firmware update which addressed the Meltdown and Spectre vulnerabilities in all PCs was causing more harm than good. The update for PCs, tablets and cloud services powered by their processors caused reboot issues on hardware including Kaby Lake, Broadwell and Haswell. In other words, the security updates for affected devices caused more harm than good.
In a new blog post, Intel once again admitted that its latest firmware update resulted in reboot issues, experienced by several users, regardless of the computers hardware specification. The chipset maker also revealed that it has discovered the root cause of the reboot issues.
If you’ve updated your Windows or Linux PCs to the latest microcode firmware version that mitigates the Spectre security flaw and you’re experiencing random reboot, Intel recommends you to wait for the fix as the chipmaker has finally identified the problem.
“We have now identified the root cause for Broadwell and Haswell platforms and made good progress in developing a solution to address it. Over the weekend, we began rolling out an early version of the updated solution to industry partners for testing, and we will make a final release available once that testing has been completed,” says Navin Shenoy in the press release.
Intel recently recommended the OS vendors, cloud service providers to stop the rollout of the update as it caused a number of unexpected problems. Intel has finally discovered a fix and the next firmware update will be released in the coming weeks. However, Intel needs a few more days to test the next update in PCs powered by their processors.
Intel is now recommending the OS vendors to roll back the firmware which would fix the randoom reboots but again the PCs will be vulnerable to Spectre. Intel adds that users could face even more reboots if the update isn’t removed by the OS vendors and cloud services providers.
Apparently, Intel is already working with their partners to test the firmware update before rolling it out to the public, this process would accelerate the global release. “We continue to urge all customers to vigilantly maintain security best practice and for consumers to keep systems up-to-date,” Intel concluded.
