Businesses fear going from bad to worse in fixing chip flaw

New York

CHANCES that a fix to a major microchip security flaw may slow down or crash some computer systems are leading some businesses to hold off installing software patches, fearing the cure may be worse than the original problem.

Researchers last week revealed security problems with chips from Intel Corp and many of its rivals, sending businesses, governments and consumers scrambling to understand the extent of the threat and the cost of fixes.

Rather than rushing to put on patches, a costly and time-intensive endeavour for major systems, some businesses are testing the fix, leaving their machines vulnerable.

"If you start applying patches across your whole fleet without doing proper testing, you could cause systems to crash, essentially putting all of your emplo…