Cisco probing networking gear as chip concerns continue

Networking giant becomes latest vendor to issue vulnerabilities updates

Cisco is probing a number of its products amid fears that recently announced chip vulnerabilities could affect its networking gear.

Reports emerged last week that a vulnerability in Intel chips has laid dormant for decades, with the potential to affect millions of computers across a range of operating systems.

Apple, Amazon and Google have since been scrambling to plug the leak, with Cisco now publishing a security update containing lists of potentially vulnerable products.

The products cited by Cisco include switches, routers and servers.

Cisco said that the majority of its products will not be susceptible because they do not allow users to run custom code, which is required to exploit the vulnerabilities.

However, it said that certain other products may be vulnerable, for which updates will be released.

"Only Cisco devices that are found to allow the customer to execute their customised code side by side with the Cisco code on the same microprocessor are considered vulnerable," Cisco said.

"A Cisco product that may be deployed as a virtual machine or a container, even while not being directly affected by any of these vulnerabilities, could be targeted by such attacks if the hosting environment is vulnerable.

"Cisco recommends customers harden their virtual environment and ensure that all security updates are installed."