Cold Boot Attacks On Encryption Keys
In computer security, a cold boot attack is a type of side-channel attack in which an attacker with physical access to a computer performs a memory dump of a computer’s random access memory by performing a hard reset of the target machine.
Security researchers have discovered a new technique for stealing sensitive data on computers and will detail how cold-start attacks can use computer firmware to allow attackers to recover passwords, credit card numbers, and other sensitive information stored in them. As we have known since 2008, cold-start attacks on encryption keys or cold-start attacks can steal the encryption key of a computer from an attacker with physical access to a machine, which remains briefly in memory after a hard reboot. The new cold start attack technique differs from the traditional cold start attack, which was developed in 2008 and allows attackers to steal the shortest information that remains on a computer before it is shut down.
The primary functionality of the cold-start attack is to obtain an encryption key…
