InSpectre

Spectre and Meltdown are two attacks designed to take advantage of the firmware vulnerabilities of high-performance processors and allow third-parties to steal data that is processed on a given computer.

Although apps cannot read data from other apps, generally speaking, the particularity of new threats is that it can get hold of sensitive data you are storing in a password manager, browser, instant messaging as well as business documents.

InSpectre is a tool that can help you determine if your current configuration is vulnerable to either of these attacks. Consequentially, you can update to the latest versions of the firmware and avert an unpleasant situation.

The idea behind the tool is to let you know if your computer can be exploited by Meltdown and Spectre, information that you can learn just by launching the tool. On a side note, the app also displays a status of the system's performance, but this is more important to read after you updated the firmware.

In addition to the summary, the utility also includes a report on the system's present situation where you can understand more about the potential security breaches. The report contains references to the processor's capabilities, hardware updates, registry and how the overall performance is going to be affected once you update the recommended components.

Despite the fact that the utility solely informs whether your computer is susceptible to a Spectre or Meltdown attack, the information can prove to be valuable as you can update the system's hardware efficiently. It is worth mentioning that updating the firmware for older hardware can cause some performance issues as the processors could be overburdened by the new features.

In the eventuality that you did not update the drivers and firmware on your hardware in a long time, then it is recommended to do so as soon as possible. InSpectre can let you know, afterwards, if the PC is still vulnerable to these threats and whether the performance is affected in any way.