The threat stems from baseboard management controllers that are embedded onto the motherboards of most servers. Widely known as BMCs, the microcontrollers allow administrators to monitor the physical status of large fleets of servers, including their temperatures, disk and memory performance, and fan speeds. But serious design flaws in the underlying intelligent platform management interface, or IPMI, make BMCs highly susceptible to hacks that can cascade throughout a network, according to a paper presented at this week’s Usenix Workshop on Offensive Technologies.

via “Bloodsucking leech” puts 100,000 servers at risk of potent attacks | Ars Technica.