As is necessary, the processor exploits have been given press-friendly names: Meltdown and Spectre.

https://meltdownattack.com/
https://spectreattack.com/ (same site)

Intel's inadequate response:

https://newsroom.intel.com/news/intel-responds-to-security-research-findings/

A write-up by Project Zero:

https://googleprojectzero.blogspot.fr/2018/01/reading-privileged-memory-with-side.html

I won't have the time to get into the low-level details tonight, but this is nasty. There are plenty of things I can say here to reiterate various topics, but I don't think that'd be constructive just yet; let's let others discover some corollaries for themselves.

Happy New Year!