• supersane@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    Does RISC-V have security benefits since it is open source? Is it easier to detect hardware backdoors if it is used instead of x86 or ARM?

    • intrepid@lemmy.ca
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      1 year ago

      RISC-V instruction set (ISA) is open source. But the actual implementation (microarchitecture) has no such obligations. And among the implementations that can run Linux, none (that I know) are open source designs.

      With regards to hardware backdoors - no, closed source RISC-V implementations are not easier than x86 or ARM to audit for security.

    • ReakDuck@lemmy.ml
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      1 year ago

      I think the CPU chips themselves are closed source but the architecture is open under MIT so this means anyone can close them