18510540. Consistent Speculation of Pointer Authentication (Apple Inc.)
Contents
Consistent Speculation of Pointer Authentication
Organization Name
Inventor(s)
John D Pape of Cedar Park TX US
Deepankar Duggal of Sunnyvale CA US
Christopher M Tsay of Austin TX US
Andrew H Lin of Mountain View CA US
Corey C Stappenbeck of Sunnyvale CA US
Consistent Speculation of Pointer Authentication
This abstract first appeared for US patent application 18510540 titled 'Consistent Speculation of Pointer Authentication
Original Abstract Submitted
In an embodiment, a processor includes hardware circuitry which may be used to authenticate instruction operands. The processor may execute instructions that perform operand authentication both speculatively and non-speculatively. During speculative execution of such instructions, the processor may execute authentication such that no differences in observable state of the processor, relative to authentication result, are detectable via a side channel. During speculative execution, a result of authentication may be deferred until speculative execution of the instruction, and additional instructions, may be completed. Upon resolution of a condition that indicates acceptance of the speculative execution, a speculative execution result may cause a processor exception and stalling of execution at the instruction to be performed.
