Speculative execution
Updated: 08/02/2019 by Computer Hope
Speculative execution is a technique used by modern CPUs (central processing units) to speed up performance. The CPU may execute certain tasks ahead of time, "speculating" that they will be needed. If the tasks are required, a speed-up is achieved, because the work is already complete.
Speculative execution can provide a significant increase in performance, but has been shown to endanger the security of privileged data in some CPUs. For example, the Meltdown security vulnerability affects some Intel CPUs due to a flaw in their speculative execution.