How to be protected against meltdown and specter

The issue of Meltdown and Specter vulnerabilities continues to speak. The security of millions of users worldwide has been affected by this problem. Something that undoubtedly has enormous consequences. For this reason, security patches have been released to protect users. Although, so far there have also been some problems with them.

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How to check if your computer is protected against Meltdown and Specter

Many users do not know if they can be affected by these vulnerabilities or not. Luckily, it is something that can be verified. We can see if our computer is already protected against Meltdown and Specter. It is a process that is not too complex to do. Therefore, we explain it below.

Steps to follow to check if you are protected against Meltdown and Specter

We present directly the steps to follow:

• Open Start Search Windows PowerShell and right click on the first result Select to run as administrator Type the command that we leave below and press enter

Install-Module SpeculationControl

• Type Y and press enter if you are asked to activate or give permission to the NutGet provider. Type "Y" again and press the ENTER or ENTER key if it asks you to confirm the installation from an unknown source. Then type the following command to save the current run configuration so that it can be restored and press enter.

$ SaveExecutionPolicy = Get-ExecutionPolicy

• Type the following command to make sure the module can be imported in the next step and hit enter

Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned -Scope Currentuser

• Type Y when prompted to confirm the run settings and hit enter Type the command below and hit enter

Import-Module SpeculationControl

• Type the following command to check if the computer has the necessary updates and press enter

Get-SpeculationControlSettings

Once these steps are done, you will be able to check if your computer has protection against the vulnerabilities of Meltdown and Specter.

In the event that your computer only has the security patch released by Windows 10, which only serves to protect against Meltdown, you will see that the requirements for "rogue data cache load", which are malicious cache data, appear in color green and also with True as value. We also have to take into account the branch target injection. It will not be present if our computer does not have the latest BIOS or UEFI from the manufacturer of your motherboard. So you should go to the website of the model of your motherboard and proceed to update the latest version (it should be online very soon).

Only after having installed the Windows 10 emergency patch and the necessary BIOS or UEFI version will all the requirements for "branch target injection" and "rogue data cache load" come out in True and highlighted in green. If this happens, it means that your computer is protected against these threats.

Once you have checked the status of your computer, type the following PowerShell command to go back to the original run configuration. Press enter, then type Y and press enter again.

Set-ExecutionPolicy $ SaveExecutionPolicy -Scope Currentuser

It seems like a long process, but it is the best way to check if your computer is protected against these two threats. So it is a good idea to do so.

How to try to protect us from both vulnerabilities

We give you some of the keys to keep in mind.

Uninstall your antivirus and leave Windows Defender

To avoid the famous blue screenshots (BSOD) of Windows, that many users are experiencing with the latest UPDATE of Windows 10, it is recommended to uninstall your antivirus (if you have one installed): Panda, McAfee, Avast, NOD32… and leave the most active than acceptable Windows Defender.

Is it one of Microsoft's recommendations ?

If it is any consolation, it is the one I currently use on my computers and for now I have not had any problem. At the moment I will touch wood…

Check that you have the latest updates

It seems silly, but the most important thing right now is to have our operating system as updated as possible. For this we must go to this route:

1. Open the settings. Click Update & Security. Click Windows Update. Click the Check for Updates button.

And we check to see if we have all the updates installed. Today in our team we have the famous KB4056892. With the passing of the days we will see new revisions installed. ? In the event that your PC is worse, uninstall the latest update until it is stable.

Have the latest BIOS of your motherboard updated

I have not yet seen any manufacturer launch renewed BIOS to "mitigate" possible problems , although at first it would not be necessary, but since we are updating our equipment, it is a good time to install the latest BIOS on our motherboard.

WE RECOMMEND YOU The best motherboards in the market (April 2018)

You just have to go to the website of your manufacturer: Asus, Gigabyte, MSI or ASRock, search for your model, download the BIOS and flash it.