Microsoft one of the biggest industry in this Computer World has again discovered several security loop holes on it many widely used products. Co-incidentally Adobe has also found some issues on their PDF reader programme and likely to release update soon! The affected products includes
- Windows 2000, XP, XP professional edition, Vista, Server 2003 and Server 2008.
- Microsoft office 2000, 2003, 2007 and XP.
- Microsoft Office 2004 and 2008 for the Mac.
- Adobe Acrobat Reader [Famous PDF reader]
According to Microsoft and adobe these updates are critical updates and must have for every users. To know more about them please read on…
About the updates and vulnerabilities:
According to Microsoft the following are some critical issues:
- A total of Six [6] critical vulnerabilities on the above said MS products which can allow an attacker to remotely execute code on a machine.
- Three [3] important vulnerabilities in Windows which can allow an attacker to elevate privileges.
- One [1] moderate vulnerability in Windows which can enable information disclosure.
So a sum total of 10 issues has been detected and likely to get fixed by the next update.
Also according to Adobe there has been some JavaScript vulnerability on the PDF Reader, which will get an fix patch by upcoming week.
When and how to get the Updates:
All the updates will be released by Tuesday of next week [9th June, 2009]. Both Microsoft security update patch and Adobe quarterly security updates will be released by the date mentioned above.
In Windows you can enable Automatic Updates to receive the updates. To do this [For XP, Vista]
- Go to Start Menu > Control Panel
- Select Windows Update/Automatic Update and change it to Auto mode.
Also here are some other ways of getting Microsoft Security Updates:
- Get Subscribed to Microsoft Technical Notification and receive Notification on your reader or Email. Click here to subscribe.
- After the release of the Updates search Microsoft Download centre with key-word “Security Updates”. Click here to search.
For Adobe Acrobat PDF reader users a detailed instruction is given in the Adobe blog. See it here.
To know more about Microsoft Critical issues read the security bulletin notification here. If you face any problem changing/configuring/installing updates then feel free to ask us!
