Dell Products Inc.

Dell & Products L.p.

Ibrahim Sayyed

Adolfo Sandor Montero

Daniel Lawrence Hamlin

Anand Prakash Joshi

Shekar Babu Suryanarayana

Amit K Tiwari

Jagadish Babu Jonnada

Purushothama R Malluru

Sumanth Vidyadhara

Balasingh Ponraj Samuel

Alok Pant

Chris Edward Pepper

Allen Chester Wynn

Ruhull Bhuiyan

Christopher Channing Griffin

Carl McAdams

Laxmi Lavanya Medicherla

Nikhil Manohar Vichare

Karunakar Poosapalli

Steven Downum

Alan H Abdelhalim

Bassem ElAzzami

Chris C Griffin

Richard Martin Tonry

Joshua Alperin

Elmira M Bonab

Venkata Rama Krishna Rao Atta

Gregory Alan Havenga

Greg Havenga

Gokul Thiruchengode Vajravel

Nicholas Diciurcio Grobelny

Danilo Ong Tan

Vivekanandh Narayanasamy Rajagopalan

Amy Christine Nelson

Michael Wayne Arms

Frank Quintanilla, Iii

Shubham Kumar

Zhao Hui Yu

Daniel L Hamlin

Manjunath Gr

Venkata Atta

Srikanth Krishnamurthy S

Balasingh P Samuel

Phanindra Talasila

Krishnaveni Sistu

Arifullah Syed Shah

Hemanth Venkatesh Murthy

Daniel L Smythia

Srinivasa Rao Samineni

Debasish Nath

Puri R Malluru

Systems and methods for post-accident health assurance in an Information Handling System (IHS) are described. In some embodiments, an IHS may include a processor and a memory coupled to the processor, where the memory comprises program instructions that, upon execution by the processor, cause a Basic Input/Output System (BIOS) to execute a diagnostics routine during a reboot in response to a determination that the IHS suffered an accident prior to the reboot.

Post-accident health assurance in an Information Handling System

Systems and methods for data backup and restore operations in response to accidents are described. In some embodiments, an Information Handling System (IHS) may include a processor and a memory coupled to the processor, the memory having program instructions stored thereon that, upon execution, cause an Operating System (OS) to receive an accident indication and change a data backup setting in response to the indication.

Data backup and restore operations in response to accidents

Systems and methods include an Information Handling System (IHS) that is adapted to address power state transition failures by an IHS. An Embedded Controller (EC) of the IHS detects a request for the IHS to transition to a low-power operating state, such as a modern standby power state. The EC monitors for progress of the IHS in transitioning to the low-power operating state. Based on the monitoring, the EC determines the SoC is preventing the transition by the IHS to the low-power operating state. The EC identifies and releases hardware resources of the IHS that are referenced by the SoC and that are preventing the transition of the IHS to the low-power operating state.

Diagnosing power state transition failures in a heterogeneous computing platform

A method for updating firmware on a device in an information handling system in a resilient manner is described. The method includes receiving a new firmware for updating a device; storing a current firmware image or a working copy of the current firmware of the device in a volatile memory; updating the device with the new firmware after storing the current firmware in the volatile memory; setting a first boot flag to perform diagnostics at a next reset of the information handling system based on updating the device with the new firmware; and determining, by the information handling system at the next reset in response to the first boot flag, whether the device satisfies at least one criteria indicating the new firmware is operational on the device. An information handling system that includes the device and performs the method is also described.

Firmware distribution method for an information handling system

Systems and methods include an Information Handling System (IHS) that is adapted to protect access to configurable settings of the IHS. Upon the IHS being powered, a UEFI boot sequence is initiated. During the boot sequence, a boot sequence notification is detected that indicates conditions required for booting an operating system of the IHS have been met. Further access to the NVRAM that stores UEFI variables is locked such that upon receiving a request for access to a UEFI variable stored in the NVRAM, the request for access to a UEFI variable is granted based on a listing of authorized applications.

Secure hardware access in a heterogeneous computing platform

An information handling system may include at least one processor and a computer-readable medium having instructions thereon that are executable by the at least one processor for: prior to initialization of an operating system, executing a first-party pre-boot firmware application, wherein the first-party pre-boot firmware application is configured to provide a graphics-mode interface; executing a third-party pre-boot firmware application, wherein the third-party pre-boot firmware application includes a visual forms representation (VFR); parsing, by the first-party pre-boot firmware application, the VFR; and displaying, by the graphics-mode user interface, a graphical user interface for the third-party pre-boot firmware application.

System context-controlled third-party firmware display and configuration by parsing pre-boot firmware application based on virtual forms representation (VFR)

Systems and methods for configuring peripherals in response to accidents are described. In some embodiments, an Information Handling System (IHS) may include: a processor; and a memory coupled to the processor, the memory having program instructions stored thereon that, upon execution by the processor, cause the IHS to: obtain a notification of a shock event of the IHS; communicate information regarding the shock event to peripheral firmware of one or more peripherals of the IHS. The peripheral firmware may receive the information regarding the shock event of the IHS from the IHS; and responsive to the information, perform a corrective action. In some embodiments, the corrective action includes a configuration update and a communication to the IHS of the configuration update, a self-test scan for health of the peripheral, shutting off port or data access to the peripheral, and/or collection of telemetry of the peripheral.

Configuring peripherals in response to accidents

Methods and system disclosed herein provide secure sensor hub enumerations to support native sensor behavior that is vulnerability free and does not permit sensor behavior overrides. In addition, disclosed subject matter enables a firmware protocol to dynamically sense vendor attributes and enumerate a unified layer that handles multiple tailored sensor hub APIs to run seamless sensor operations across various chipset vendors and to enable sensor attribute reset without a need for factory defaults. Disclosed methods may create an abstracted firmware map used to dynamically generate a runtime sensor memory map that is independent of silicon vendor to abstract the flash payload with sensor HID attribute objects.

Silicon-agnostic sensor hub abstraction

A disclosed method for provisioning an information handling system includes accessing a custom certificate database (CCD) including one or more certificates corresponding to one or more custom firmware features and generating a custom db variable for the CCD, which is subordinate to a default OEM db variable for the CCD. The custom db variable may be provided to a system BIOS residing in an SPI flash device. Responsive to the BIOS validating the custom db variable against a Secure Boot platform key, the custom db variable may be stored to a second NVM device. The custom db variable may be injected into a default Secure Boot db variable residing on the SPI flash. Prior to executing any of the one or more custom firmware features associated with the CCD, the custom db variable is verified with a certificate residing in the SPI flash.

Enabling UEFI secure boot key variable extensions to accommodate custom secure boot keys

A data processing system comprising a processor having a working memory and processing logic, a boot system configured to load one or more algorithms for initializing a basic input output system (BIOS) of the processor into the working memory and an error correction system configured to start a watchdog timer and to monitor initialization of the processor, the error correction system further configured to implement a corrective process if the watchdog timer times out prior to initialization of the BIOS of the processor.

Error correction dynamic method to detect and troubleshoot system boot failures

An information handling system may determine a pre-boot security posture, and update an advanced configuration and power interface mitigation table with the pre-boot security posture. The system may also update a security mitigation table based on a security mitigation policy, and determine a security mitigation based on a protection flag in the advanced configuration and power interface mitigation table and the security mitigation table.

Pre-boot context-based security mitigation

An information handling system may include at least one host processor and an embedded controller (EC) including an EC processor. The information handling system may be configured to: execute an application on the at least one host processor; provide a communication channel between the application and the EC, wherein the application is configured to issue input/output (I/O) requests to the EC; execute an application handler on the EC processor, wherein the application handler is configured to: create records indicating the I/O requests and times associated with the I/O requests; and respond to the I/O requests based on the records and based on a per-application policy.

Embedded controller method for prevention of denial of service attacks

Disclosed systems and methods address escalated vulnerability attributable to system down time. In at least one embodiment, a customer-selectable threshold of detection establishes the number of days a system is allowed to be 'down' before forcing a secured update path as described herein. The threshold may represent a compromise and balance between inconvenience and security based on each customer's preference. Tracking of system down time or offline time may be managed via EC/SBIOS and a real time clock (RTC) timer. The system down time may then be compared to the customer setting, e.g., whenever the system is booted.

Securely closing system vulnerability window after extended down time

An information handling system includes an embedded controller and a memory device storing code that when executed causes the embedded controller to perform operations that includes receiving a request to change a security setting, determining a security policy associated with the security setting, and determining whether the change to the security setting deviates from the security policy. In addition, the embedded controller in response to determining that the change to the security setting deviates from the security policy, denying the request and reverting the change to the security setting.

Pre-operating system embedded controller hardening based on operating system security awareness

An information handling system may include at least one processor and a computer-readable medium having instructions thereon that are executable by the at least one processor. The instructions may be executable for: prior to initialization of an operating system, executing a first-party pre-boot firmware application, wherein the first-party pre-boot firmware application is configured to provide system-level context information; executing a third-party pre-boot firmware application, wherein the third-party pre-boot firmware application is configured to receive the system-level context information from the first-party pre-boot firmware application; and displaying a user interface for the third-party pre-boot firmware application, wherein at least one element of the user interface is based on the system-level context information.

System context-aware third party firmware safe assurance configuration

Growing community of inventors

Georgetown, TX, United States of America

Ibrahim Sayyed