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0 pointswalterbell1y ago0 comments

Hopefully these new cellular, wifi and bluetooth basebands can avoid the zero-day fame of their predecessors.

0 comments

In this specific case, I imagine the system is much more secure. The Broadcom chip and Qualcomm chip each represented their own separate attack surface. Even without hacking the AP those chips were still a problem.

GeekyBear1y ago

I would assume that Apple's new firmware would have been written in a memory safe language.

They did make some noise about enabling Swift for embedded development at last years WWDC.

Although Qualcomm's big zero day last year was related to the DSP and not the baseband, I believe.

iknowstuff1y ago

Here’s hoping. Bets on Swift v Rust?

I swear if they wrote a modem from scratch in C that’s a major own goal

scrlk1y ago

There's a number of firmware jobs on their website at the moment. All of them ask for C or C++ experience - I haven't seen anything that's asking for Rust or Embedded Swift experience.

E.g.: https://jobs.apple.com/en-us/details/200579953/embedded-5g-4...

1 more reply

DrBenCarson1y ago

Definitely Swift https://swift.org/blog/embedded-swift-examples/

saagarjha1y ago

It’s C(++) judging by the strings in the firmware

internet20001y ago

Is the firmware available somewhere already?

1 more reply

FirmwareBurner1y ago

>I would assume that Apple's new firmware would have been written in a memory safe language.

Memory safe languages don't protect from human programmer complacency and stupidity, or from incidental alphabet agency backdoors.

DrBenCarson1y ago

Sure, but they do protect from a massive swath of real attacks

Don’t guarantee complete safety but do eliminate a massive attack surface

GeekyBear1y ago

The patch notes for Qualcomm's big zero day exploit last year certainly gives the impression that this was yet another example of a memory safety error.

> According to the patch instructions, the fix works by adding direct memory access handle references.

https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/366612994/Hig...

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse

0 comments

conradev1y ago

GeekyBear1y ago

I would assume that Apple's new firmware would have been written in a memory safe language.

They did make some noise about enabling Swift for embedded development at last years WWDC.

Although Qualcomm's big zero day last year was related to the DSP and not the baseband, I believe.

iknowstuff1y ago

Here’s hoping. Bets on Swift v Rust?

I swear if they wrote a modem from scratch in C that’s a major own goal

scrlk1y ago

There's a number of firmware jobs on their website at the moment. All of them ask for C or C++ experience - I haven't seen anything that's asking for Rust or Embedded Swift experience.

E.g.: https://jobs.apple.com/en-us/details/200579953/embedded-5g-4...

1 more reply

DrBenCarson1y ago

Definitely Swift https://swift.org/blog/embedded-swift-examples/

saagarjha1y ago

It’s C(++) judging by the strings in the firmware

internet20001y ago

Is the firmware available somewhere already?

1 more reply

FirmwareBurner1y ago

>I would assume that Apple's new firmware would have been written in a memory safe language.

Memory safe languages don't protect from human programmer complacency and stupidity, or from incidental alphabet agency backdoors.

DrBenCarson1y ago

Sure, but they do protect from a massive swath of real attacks

Don’t guarantee complete safety but do eliminate a massive attack surface

GeekyBear1y ago

The patch notes for Qualcomm's big zero day exploit last year certainly gives the impression that this was yet another example of a memory safety error.

> According to the patch instructions, the fix works by adding direct memory access handle references.

https://www.techtarget.com/searchsecurity/news/366612994/Hig...

j / k navigate · click thread line to collapse