BlueHat Seattle 2019 || Guarding Against Physical Attacks: The Xbox One Story
Microsoft Security Response Center (MSRC)2 HN recommenders · 2020–2026
7K views · talk · evergreen · Uploaded 2019-10-30
Tony Chen of Microsoft explains at BlueHat Seattle 2019 how the Xbox One was designed to resist physical attacks. He covers the security design and hypervisor-based OS architecture that kept the console uncracked for years.
HN recommends it as a fascinating, authoritative account of console hardware security, often cited in threads on hardware security and anti-cheat.
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4 comments from Hacker News
> Why else would they design it for the xbox, of all things? If you really want to know the answer, here's the lead engineer explaining it en detail: [VIDEO]
> It is an interesting attack but is the above goal ever achievable? To protect against adversaries from the inside. People have gotten very close to achieving similar goals. For example, modern games consoles' anti-piracy measures guard against the device owner who has physical control and unlimited time. [1] iPhone activation locks likewise prevent stolen phones from being used, even by thieves with physical control and unlimited time. And neither of the systems rely on the clunky 'brick the device if the case is opened' methods of yesteryear. (Of course there have also been a great many failed attempts - almost every console since the dawn of time has eventually been hacked, as have things like TPMs and TrustZone, many versions of the iPhone were rooted, etc etc) [1] [VIDEO]
Everything is very much separated. It's actually a series of OSes running in a hypervisor. [LINK] [VIDEO] (for software discussion check around the 19:00 mark but the whole talk is incredible)
Given that it held up against 13 years of dedicated efforts by people with physical access to the device, many years after its successor was launched, it seems merited in this case. This talk about some of what went into it is fascinating: [VIDEO]