The Risk of RISC-V: What's Going on at SiFive?
morethanmoore.substack.com
Ian Cutress muses upon rumors around SiFive, the forerunner of high-performance RISC-V cores.
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Ian Cutress muses upon rumors around SiFive, the forerunner of high-performance RISC-V cores.
security through obscurity is a bad practice.
it's better to be transparent and let everyone analyze your design. the more eyes on it, the better. even the proprietary and obscured Intel CPUs have had security vulnerabilities in the past.
I don't think it's so much "security by obscurity" as it's an issue of a much lower bar for chip production. Intentional back doors or malware represent a huge risk for a product line, so manufacturers won't put them in without someone like the NSA leaning on them. It's a simple risk/benefit calculation.
But the risk is much lower if you can snag a processor design off the 'net, make your modifications, send it off to a fab and sell it under a fly-by-night operation. If it's ever discovered, you take the money and run.