Vulnerabilities discovered in computer microchips have potential to leak passwords and sensitive data

It was announced in the media in early January 2018 that numerous vulnerabilities in nearly all computer microchips had been identified. These vulnerabilities have the potential to allow rogue malicious applications to read data stored on a computer's system memory. These flaws, named Spectre and Meltdown, could potentially effect nearly every CPU released since 1995 and affect personal computers, mobile devices, cloud computing services and servers.

This is a global issue and as a result we are taking steps to protect your data. We are working with our vendors to rectify and remedy the known vulnerabilities and we have already applied apply software patches to our web servers.  Further patches may be required in the future as they are rolled out.

Due to the severity of these vulnerabilities, we are unable to schedule the patching and reboot process. It is yet unknown what the impact these patches will have on operating system performance, however we will continue to monitor our platforms and make the necessary adjustments where needed.

 

More Information

This article in the New York Times explains the issue in layman's terms and provides advice on what you can do to protect your personal computers and devices:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/01/04/technology/meltdown-spectre-questions.html

 

Technical Explanation

If you would like to know more about the technical aspects of Spectre and Meltdown, go to:
https://meltdownattack.com/