RowHammer, ThrowHammer and NetHammer attacks

Summary

In this paper, I presented and compared the different attacks about RowHammer, ThrowHammer and NetHammer but the special focus was lying on the RowHammer attack because this attack is the basis of the other attacks. Firstly, I gave an overview about the Internet, personal computers on households and how the technology developed year by year in order to bring a better feeling of understanding about todays capabilities and possibilities. Subsequently I demonstrated some details about the RAM, DRAM and also explained for what they will be used because these components are very important components of machines like computer. They are very affected by those attacks. Furthermore I described the attacks beginning by the RowHammer attack and how it works and what it uses in order to make the attack happen.

Requirements for RowHammer attack

• Have access to local computer
• Execute local code which rapidly and repeatedly reopens rows on DRAM cells
• This cause bit flips on adjacent rows

Requirements for ThrowHammer attack

• This is a remote attack
• Both attacker and victim computers have to enable RDMA on the NIC
• Attacker needs a fast network connection to victim computer
• Attacker sends packets as many as possible and as fast as possible to victim
• RDMA does write the data directly on the victim application instead on a buffer in-between
• This causes bit flips on DRAM cell rows

Requirements for NetHammer attack

• This is a remote attack
• This attack does neither need an executable code or RDMA enabled NICs
• Attacker needs a fast network connection to victim computer
• Attacker sends packets as many as possible and as fast as possible to victim, for example UDP packets with minimum packet size of 64 bytes
• It does not directly cause bit flips on the cells but instead it keeps reopening rows permanently which can cause bit flips

Description

Step 1

Enter these commands in the shell

echo foo
echo bar

Step 2

Make sure to read

• War and Peace
• Lord of the Rings
• The Baroque Cycle

Used Hardware

Device to be used with this documentation Maybe another device to be used with this documentation

Courses

• A course where this documentation was used (2017, 2018)
• Another one (2018)

References

• https://wikipedia.org
• https://google.com