The discovery of hardware bugs in almost every computer, laptop, tablet and smartphone is evidence of the imperfect foresight human actions are apt to have. The flaws – nicknamed Meltdown and Spectre – are so fundamental that they could allow hackers to steal computers’ most secure secrets. In seeking to speed up microprocessors and diffuse them into every part of modern life, chipmakers wanted to exploit the potential of technology but paid too little heed to the pitfalls.

The problems are rooted in the trade-off between speed and security. Computing capacity has doubled every 18 months, in line with Moore’s law. This has allowed the digitisation of everything: every second today 2.6m emails are sent, 64,533 Google searches made and 7,885 opinions tweeted. Processors were optimised for performance, without basic questions being asked about whether their design was secure. It turns out they are not. One error can be “patched” – but will slow down machines by up to 30%, which makes a mockery of the need for speed. The other is so foundational that a complete re-imagining of processors will be needed. In the meantime we have to live with the risk of a hacking takedown of computer systems we let capture, organise and optimise our lives.