The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 20, 2012
Filed:
May. 21, 2008
Geoffrey Pike, Irvine, CA (US);
Geoffrey Pike, Irvine, CA (US);
VMware, Inc., Palo Alto, CA (US);
Abstract
In a system where an indirect control flow instruction requires a CPU to consult a first memory address, in addition to what is encoded in the instruction itself, for program execution, a method is provided to determine if the first memory address contains a valid or plausible value. The first memory address is compared to an expected or predicted memory address. A difference between the expected or predicted memory address and the first memory address causes an evaluation of any program code about to be executed. The evaluation of code determines whether or not a malicious attack is occurring, or being attempted, that might affect proper operation of the system or program.