Intel get hit with a 5 Billion Dollar Class Action Lawsuit from the City of Providence, RI

[mr moose]

 I would laugh though if the judge says Intel is liable and worked out the pro-rata rate of compensation based on the the 3 months from CL release to the time a patch published.  Considering that is 3 months of liability out of 23 Years and they are after $6B,  I think Intel would have to pay every person in the providence who owned an Intel chip for the entire 23 years about $1.76.
 

[Blademaster91]

I think this vulnerability thing is very blown out of proportion thanks to all the clickbait articles and Google disclosing everything without a care before a patch is ready, would most of these lawsuits hold up in court? I kinda doubt "negligence" since no one knew about the vulnerability then,there are probably other "flaws" in processors companies aren't going to admit,which are unavoidable due to how complex modern cpu's are unless Intel/AMD/ARM go back to hand designing processors which would slow down progress. These courts are just going to set back CPU performance for everyone,and Intel will recoup lost money by charging more for their product in the end, Nvidia raised prices after the 970 lawsuit.

 

 

[LAwLz]

8 hours ago, NQSD said:

Intel is in hot water with a lot of law suits, but why isn't AMD getting any lawsuits? AMD also have same types of vulnerability in their chips.

They are, but Intel is the far bigger target.

 

 

8 hours ago, SC2Mitch said:

They wasn't hit that badly compared to Intel, AMD only had 1** defect but it's extremely difficult to pull off while Intel had all 3 of them. 

 

** One bug was patched via OS patch

Intel was vulnerable to 3 exploits.

AMD was vulnerable to 2 exploits.

 

The only difference between the two is Meltdown.

if you're going to not count the patched ones then both Intel and AMD are currently as vulnerable as each other since Meltdown has been fixed.

 

 

 

26 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

and Google disclosing everything without a care before a patch is ready

No, stop right there.

Google did NOT "disclose everything without a care".

What happened was that The Register discovered some OS patches and started digging. Here is a quote from the original article which disclosed Meltdown and Spectre:

Quote

Details of the vulnerability within Intel's silicon are under wraps: an embargo on the specifics is due to lift early this month, perhaps in time for Microsoft's Patch Tuesday. Indeed, patches for the Linux kernel are available for all to see but comments in the source code have been redacted to obfuscate the issue.

However, some details of the flaw have surfaced, and so this is what we know.

 

Google, along with other companies, had agreed on a set date for the disclose. It's just that some people noticed things and started putting the pieces together. There was a disclose plan in place, but because of the Register article people started digging it was discovered earlier than expected.

[ItsMitch]

3 hours ago, Blademaster91 said:

I think this vulnerability thing is very blown out of proportion thanks to all the clickbait articles and Google disclosing everything without a care before a patch is ready, would most of these lawsuits hold up in court? I kinda doubt "negligence" since no one knew about the vulnerability then,there are probably other "flaws" in processors companies aren't going to admit,which are unavoidable due to how complex modern cpu's are unless Intel/AMD/ARM go back to hand designing processors which would slow down progress. These courts are just going to set back CPU performance for everyone,and Intel will recoup lost money by charging more for their product in the end, Nvidia raised prices after the 970 lawsuit.

 

 

Oh definitely I agree with the blown out part, lawyers are looking for easy way to earn money and get intel fucked in whatever way they want.

[DwayneElizondo]

2 hours ago, LAwLz said:

They are, but Intel is the far bigger target.

Intel was vulnerable to 3 exploits.

AMD was vulnerable to 2 exploits.

The only difference between the two is Meltdown.

if you're going to not count the patched ones then both Intel and AMD are currently as vulnerable as each other since Meltdown has been fixed.

 

There is also the fact that the majority of Ryzen cpus were released before Spectre/Meltdown were discovered (I think only threadripper was launched after, but is was practically too late for it), while Intel accelerated the release of Coffee Lake to counter AMD, fully knowingly that the were releasing faulty cpus with no patch at hand - basically the definition of fraud

[LAwLz]

1 minute ago, DwayneElizondo said:

There is also the fact that the majority of Ryzen cpus were released before Spectre/Meltdown were discovered (I think only threadripper was launched after, but is was practically too late for it), while Intel accelerated the release of Coffee Lake to counter AMD, fully knowingly that the were releasing faulty cpus with no patch at hand - basically the definition of fraud

1) AMD released several CPUs after they were informed about Spectre and Meltdown. Including but not limited to Ryzen R3, their Pro lineup, Threadripper, and are still continuing to release vulenrable product to this day with their APUs.

2) I strongly doubt Intel rushed to get Coffee Lake out in stores before the disclosure happened. There is no evidence for that. 

3) Intel, and AMD among others, were working on patches.

4) That is not the definition of fraud.

 

If you think Intel committed fraud then you must also believe that AMD did too. Both continued sales of old and new products knowing full well that they were vulnerable. I personally don't think either of them are guilty of fraud.

 

What do you think they should have done? Halted sales of all processors, scrapped the processors that are in the pipelines, while simultaneously trying to not drawing attention to it?

Or do you think they should have continued to sell their processors like normal, while developing patches to be ready for when the NDA was lifted?

[Blademaster91]

25 minutes ago, SC2Mitch said:

Oh definitely I agree with the blown out part, lawyers are looking for easy way to earn money and get intel fucked in whatever way they want.

Not that I don't think Intel would be hurting much from losing a few billion, though yeah the lawyers take most of the money out of these class actions.

2 minutes ago, DwayneElizondo said:

There is also the fact that the majority of Ryzen cpus were released before Spectre/Meltdown were discovered (I think only threadripper was launched after, but is was practically too late for it), while Intel accelerated the release of Coffee Lake to counter AMD, fully knowingly that the were releasing faulty cpus with no patch at hand - basically the definition of fraud

Intel and AMD plans their CPU's out years ahead, Intel couldn't stop Coffe Lake,they probably had Coffee Lake chips finished well before Spectre/Meltdown was widely known. Since Intel released CPU's before it was discovered it makes AMD and ARM guilty of negligence too.

[DwayneElizondo]

18 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

1) AMD released several CPUs after they were informed about Spectre and Meltdown. Including but not limited to Ryzen R3, their Pro lineup, Threadripper, and are still continuing to release vulenrable product to this day with their APUs.

2) I strongly doubt Intel rushed to get Coffee Lake out in stores before the disclosure happened. There is no evidence for that. 

3) Intel, and AMD among others, were working on patches.

4) That is not the definition of fraud.

 

If you think Intel committed fraud then you must also believe that AMD did too. Both continued sales of old and new products knowing full well that they were vulnerable. I personally don't think either of them are guilty of fraud.

 

What do you think they should have done? Halted sales of all processors, scrapped the processors that are in the pipelines, while simultaneously trying to not drawing attention to it?

Or do you think they should have continued to sell their processors like normal, while developing patches to be ready for when the NDA was lifted?

1) AMD was supplying a product line that was already out - still guilty of releasing a faulty product, but less than Intel

2) 8700k was out of stock for months after it's release date + Kaby lake was released only 7 months earlier - don't tell me it wasn't a panic reaction by Intel on ryzen

3) Yes, were working without having the certainty that those patches were going to work. You don't sell a car with a faulty airbag expecting to be able to figure out a fix a couple of months later

4) From google

fraud

 

noun

1. wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.

    

   Intel sold new cpu fully knowingly that they were susceptible to spectre/meltdown. And yes, imho they should've at least not rushed coffee lake release.

    

    

    

   6 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

   Not that I don't think Intel would be hurting much from losing a few billion, though yeah the lawyers take most of the money out of these class actions.

   Intel and AMD plans their CPU's out years ahead, Intel couldn't stop Coffe Lake,they probably had Coffee Lake chips finished well before Spectre/Meltdown was widely known. Since Intel released CPU's before it was discovered it makes AMD and ARM guilty of negligence too.

    

   Yes, AMD is guilty too. But Intel didn't have the Cooffee lake skus ready at all. A responsible company would've waited till january to relase the new platform, probably with a patch already applied (and exaclty 1y after kaby lake).  IMHO they didn't expect the success of ryzen, and expecting Coffee lake to be launched with an higher clocked Zen+ as direct competition, they preferred to rush it to make it compete with the "slower" Ryzen 1xxx.

[DwayneElizondo]

Just now, DwayneElizondo said:

1) AMD was supplying a product line that was already out - still guilty of releasing a faulty product, but less than Intel

2) 8700k was out of stock for months after it's release date + Kaby lake was released only 7 months earlier - don't tell me it wasn't a panic reaction by Intel on ryzen

3) Yes, were working without having the certainty that those patches were going to work. You don't sell a car with a faulty airbag expecting to be able to figure out a fix a couple of months later

4) From google

fraud

 

noun

1. wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.

    

   Intel sold new cpu fully knowingly that they were susceptible to spectre/meltdown. And yes, imho they should've at least not rushed coffee lake release.

    

    

    

    

   Yes, AMD is guilty too. But Intel didn't have the Cooffee lake skus ready at all. A responsible company would've waited till january to relase the new platform, probably with a patch already applied (and exaclty 1y after kaby lake).  IMHO they didn't expect the success of ryzen, and expecting Coffee lake to be launched with an higher clocked Zen+ as direct competition, they preferred to rush it to make it compete with the "slower" Ryzen 1xxx.

 

[DildorTheDecent]

13 hours ago, LordofGangsters said:

Assuming every single person in Rhode Island purchased an effected Intel CPU and joined the class action, and were awarded the full amount, it would be $5000 per person.

ez money.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

13 hours ago, NQSD said:

Intel is in hot water with a lot of law suits, but why isn't AMD getting any lawsuits? AMD also have same types of vulnerability in their chips.

Aside from not being exactly the same type of vulnerabilities (see several posts on this above), the main point is that to join a class action, or to sue on your own, you have to be a costumer. Insane market share, especially at the enterprise and institutional level, means a much larger base of potential lawsuits to begin with.

[LordofGangsters]

13 hours ago, WhisperingKnickers said:

Honestly though, it was like two or three years ago the wealthiest resident wanted to move to a different state and it really messed up their tax situation. The one guy was pretty much personally funding the entire state just from his tax money

What happens when Judge Judy moves out of Delaware?

[mynameisjuan]

Sweet, another lawsuit led by retards who are suing solely for money because they are too fucking dumb to understand how bugs come up in the first place.

 

I hope intel wins but I know they wont because ignorance of the judge and jury will be the fall of them. 

[LAwLz]

1 hour ago, DwayneElizondo said:

1) AMD was supplying a product line that was already out - still guilty of releasing a faulty product, but less than Intel

How so? Just because AMD released new chips with similar names to their existing chips on the market doesn't mean they are less "guilty" of this crime you are accusing Intel of.  Intel released a new generation of their high end chips, and AMD released a new generation of their low end chips, on top of a new generation of super high end chips and the entire Pro line which spanned high to low end.

 

1 hour ago, DwayneElizondo said:

2) 8700k was out of stock for months after it's release date + Kaby lake was released only 7 months earlier - don't tell me it wasn't a panic reaction by Intel on ryzen

Panic reaction to Ryzen != "Quick we must get these chips out before Spectre and meltdown gets disclosed!".

You're accusing Intel of the latter without any evidence. It might have been the former, or it might have been neither.

 

1 hour ago, DwayneElizondo said:

3) Yes, were working without having the certainty that those patches were going to work. You don't sell a car with a faulty airbag expecting to be able to figure out a fix a couple of months later

It's an incredibly complex issue and we have learned a lot more about them as more people have started examining the behavior.

I think people underestimate how difficult it is to fix these issues. Here is one of the mailing threads regarding how the Linux kernel implements the various fixes. As you can probably tell, it's a a huge and complex task.

 

Making a patch for this is not like hammering in a nail, where you can do it in one fell swoop and then everything is perfect again.

 

 

 

1 hour ago, DwayneElizondo said:

wrongful or criminal deception intended to result in financial or personal gain.

 

Intel sold new cpu fully knowingly that they were susceptible to spectre/meltdown. And yes, imho they should've at least not rushed coffee lake release.

Can you please elaborate on how selling processors was "criminal deception"?

Also, can you please suggest what they should have done instead? If you truly believe that selling a product containing a known security issue is fraud then it would have been fraud to sell any processor. Old or new.

 

I find this entire argument as ridiculous as if someone said Toyota were accused of fraud because they knew you could be harmed if you were in a car accident. "They can't just sell a car and hope that airbags will save you in the case of an accident!".

[Jito463]

23 minutes ago, LAwLz said:

How so? Just because AMD released new chips with similar names to their existing chips on the market doesn't mean they are less "guilty" of this crime you are accusing Intel of.  Intel released a new generation of their high end chips, and AMD released a new generation of their low end chips, on top of a new generation of super high end chips and the entire Pro line which spanned high to low end.

All the Ryzen processors (including Threadripper even) are based off the same architecture.  Releasing Ryzen 5 & 3 don't constitute a new product line, just new additions to the existing line.  They still use the exact same cores that are in the Ryzen 7 chips.  Technically speaking, it's also the same cores used in Epyc.  Coffee Lake, on the other hand, was a new architecture that was launched - arguably rushed to market, based on their limited availability - well after Intel was informed of the vulnerability.

[DwayneElizondo]

1 hour ago, LAwLz said:

Panic reaction to Ryzen != "Quick we must get these chips out before Spectre and meltdown gets disclosed!".

You're accusing Intel of the latter without any evidence. It might have been the former, or it might have been neither.

I'm not saying that Intel panicked for Spectre/meltdown - I'm saying that they panicked for Ryzen. AMD is launching right now the second gen, which would've been compared to the 8-th gen intel that should've launched around the same period of kaby lake - i.e. january. By rushing coffe lake intel managed to have its 6-core cpus compared to the first gen ryzen and gain back the month-on-month supremacy in sales that it lost after ryzen launched. 

1 hour ago, LAwLz said:

It's an incredibly complex issue and we have learned a lot more about them as more people have started examining the behavior.

I think people underestimate how difficult it is to fix these issues. Here is one of the mailing threads regarding how the Linux kernel implements the various fixes. As you can probably tell, it's a a huge and complex task.

Making a patch for this is not like hammering in a nail, where you can do it in one fell swoop and then everything is perfect again.

If fixing this thing is not that easy, than maybe you shouldn't ship a product with such vulnerability and expect to be able to fix it at a "later date"

1 hour ago, LAwLz said:

Can you please elaborate on how selling processors was "criminal deception"?

Also, can you please suggest what they should have done instead? If you truly believe that selling a product containing a known security issue is fraud then it would have been fraud to sell any processor. Old or new.

I find this entire argument as ridiculous as if someone said Toyota were accused of fraud because they knew you could be harmed if you were in a car accident. "They can't just sell a car and hope that airbags will save you in the case of an accident!".

There's a big difference between selling something that structurally could be targeted by vulnerabilities, and selling something you KNOW is vulnerable. There is criminal deception in the fact that Intel did not disclose that their new cpus (and a huge chunk of old ones as well) were susceptible to a known bug. In simpler terms, would a lot of the people who bought a coffe lake cpu still buy them after being disclosed to the real and at this moment known vulnerabilities of it? Some would say yes, some no. Intel did not give us the choice; it's like with cigs, if you know that they can give you cancer you can choose to smoke or not, and then if you die, well, you knew beforehand the risks. 

 

 

[Energycore]

18 hours ago, Eduard the weeb said:

Not really sure if you really can call negligence because no one knew this was a problem until google right ?

You can, because Intel allegedly knows about these vulnerabilities since June, but 1) didn't fix upcoming processors (coffee lake and later) on the hardware level and 2) didn't disclose both the vulnerability or whether they were working on a fix since then. They waited quite a while (more than 6 months), and while it makes sense to not disclose the vulnerability until a fix is underway so as to not call the attention of criminal minds into it, Intel didn't say anything at all.

 

And the first fix they deployed was a buggy mess that cause computers to crash everywhere.

 

So some argument can be made that they were negligent.

[dalekphalm]

14 minutes ago, Energycore said:

You can, because Intel allegedly knows about these vulnerabilities since June, but 1) didn't fix upcoming processors (coffee lake and later) on the hardware level and 2) didn't disclose both the vulnerability or whether they were working on a fix since then. They waited quite a while (more than 6 months), and while it makes sense to not disclose the vulnerability until a fix is underway so as to not call the attention of criminal minds into it, Intel didn't say anything at all.

 

And the first fix they deployed was a buggy mess that cause computers to crash everywhere.

 

So some argument can be made that they were negligent.

Here's the thing though - I doubt that Intel could have fixed the issue on a hardware level with Coffee Lake. It was likely way too far down the pipe for that. I guess you could say they should have delayed it to implement the hardware fix.

 

And in an ideal world, yes.

 

But AMD wasn't delaying their R3's or their Threadrippers or their Ryzen Pro's.

 

I guess it comes down to, if Intel is guilty of all this stuff, so is every CPU manufacturer (including AMD, ARM/Qualcomm/Samsung/Apple, etc).

[Energycore]

Just now, dalekphalm said:

Here's the thing though - I doubt that Intel could have fixed the issue on a hardware level with Coffee Lake. It was likely way too far down the pipe for that. I guess you could say they should have delayed it to implement the hardware fix.

 

And in an ideal world, yes.

 

But AMD wasn't delaying their R3's or their Threadrippers or their Ryzen Pro's.

 

I guess it comes down to, if Intel is guilty of all this stuff, so is every CPU manufacturer (including AMD, ARM/Qualcomm/Samsung/Apple, etc).

Yeah, that's my take on all this.

 

But I do think this suit is a bit over the top.

[Jito463]

2 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

But AMD wasn't delaying their R3's or their Threadrippers or their Ryzen Pro's.

I point to my previous post.

6 hours ago, Jito463 said:

All the Ryzen processors (including Threadripper even) are based off the same architecture.  Releasing Ryzen 5 & 3 don't constitute a new product line, just new additions to the existing line.  They still use the exact same cores that are in the Ryzen 7 chips.  Technically speaking, it's also the same cores used in Epyc.  Coffee Lake, on the other hand, was a new architecture that was launched - arguably rushed to market, based on their limited availability - well after Intel was informed of the vulnerability.

 

I do agree with the below, however.

2 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Here's the thing though - I doubt that Intel could have fixed the issue on a hardware level with Coffee Lake. It was likely way too far down the pipe for that.

 

[dalekphalm]

8 minutes ago, Jito463 said:

I point to my previous post.

 

I do agree with the below, however.

 

Yeah but my points are related. If Ryzen 3 is the same architecture as previous Ryzen (which it was), and for that reason, we cannot expect them to make a fix, then the same reasoning applies for Coffee Lake. It was too far along to make that kind of hardware change. Had they delayed Coffee Lake to make that change, it would have essentially been a new architecture.

 

If Coffee Lake can be delayed to make the change, then Ryzen 3 could be delayed to be modified to make the change too. Would it have cost Intel and/or AMD a ton of money to do so? You bet. Would the changes have taken a long time? I have no idea - but probably.

[Jito463]

3 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

Yeah but my points are related. If Ryzen 3 is the same architecture as previous Ryzen (which it was), and for that reason, we cannot expect them to make a fix, then the same reasoning applies for Coffee Lake. It was too far along to make that kind of hardware change. Had they delayed Coffee Lake to make that change, it would have essentially been a new architecture.

 

If Coffee Lake can be delayed to make the change, then Ryzen 3 could be delayed to be modified to make the change too. Would it have cost Intel and/or AMD a ton of money to do so? You bet. Would the changes have taken a long time? I have no idea - but probably.

I'm not arguing that they should have delayed it, as it's unlikely they could have fixed the problem (though I wouldn't have been opposed to them making the effort).  On that we pretty much agree.  It's more concerning to me that they rushed it out to market, even after knowing about the flaw, possibly even because of it.  The limited supply is proof enough to me that they weren't ready to release.

[dalekphalm]

1 minute ago, Jito463 said:

I'm not arguing that they should have delayed it, as it's unlikely they could have fixed the problem (though I wouldn't have been opposed to them making the effort).  On that we pretty much agree.  It's more concerning to me that they rushed it out to market, even after knowing about the flaw, possibly even because of it.  The limited supply is proof enough to me that they weren't ready to release.

But them rushing to market because of the flaw is entirely speculation, with zero facts to back it up.

 

Likely, if they did indeed rush to market, it was to combat Ryzen, and for no other reason.

 

If said reasoning is correct, then them delaying it would not have changed a single thing about Spectre + Meltdown.

[Jito463]

18 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

But them rushing to market because of the flaw is entirely speculation, with zero facts to back it up.

We can at least agree that they weren't prepared for launch.  Normally, manufacturers will spend months producing sufficient quantities to satisfy demand all over the world.  They had nowhere near the quantity needed to do so.

 

I do concede that I have no proof it was due to Meltdown, but then, I never claimed as much.

21 minutes ago, Jito463 said:

even after knowing about the flaw, possibly even because of it.

Possibly means it's an uncertainty.  I'm not trying to say it's a fact, just that it's possible that was part of the cause.  The fact that I used the word 'possible' means I acknowledge I'm speculating.

[dalekphalm]

52 minutes ago, Jito463 said:

We can at least agree that they weren't prepared for launch.  Normally, manufacturers will spend months producing sufficient quantities to satisfy demand all over the world.  They had nowhere near the quantity needed to do so.

 

I do concede that I have no proof it was due to Meltdown, but then, I never claimed as much.

Possibly means it's an uncertainty.  I'm not trying to say it's a fact, just that it's possible that was part of the cause.  The fact that I used the word 'possible' means I acknowledge I'm speculating.

Well let's be clear, Intel, AMD, NVIDIA, they are all guilty of doing paper launches. Sometimes for seemingly no reason.

 

At least here, it's more clear that they were rushing in response to AMD.