Glasser Tech Tips: Do you have updates waiting?

Tuesday June 14, 2011 was Patch Tuesday. If your computer is not up to date, now is the time to install those Microsoft updates. Below describes pretty much what the latest release of updates will fix.

16 Bulletins, 34 Vulnerabilities, Lots of Patching

Lately attackers have focused on leveraging web and browser-based vulnerabilities to install malware via "Drive-by Downloads." So you may want to install the Critical IE updates before the others.

Microsoft has posted their June Patch Day summary, which contains 16 security bulletins, nine of which they rate as Critical. The bulletins fix around 34 vulnerabilities in many Microsoft products, including:

Severity: High

Summary:

· These vulnerabilities affects: All current versions of Internet Explorer, running on all current versions of Windows

· How an attacker exploits it: Typically, by enticing one of your users to visit a malicious web page

· Impact: In the worst case an attacker can execute code on your user's computer, gaining complete control of it

· What to do: Deploy the appropriate Internet Explorer patches immediately, or let Windows Automatic Update do it for you

Exposure:

· MS11-050: IE Cumulative Update

Microsoft warns of 11 new IE vulnerabilities in their cumulative IE update. Though these 11 flaws differ technically, most of them (eight) share the same general scope and impact. They all involve memory corruption issues having to do with how IE handles various HTML elements, such as link properties and layout memory. If an attacker can lure one of your users to a web page containing malicious web code, he could exploit any one of these memory corruption vulnerabilities to execute code on that user's computer, inheriting that user's privileges. Typically, Windows users have local administrative privileges, in which case the attacker gains complete control of the victim's computer. Attackers often leverage these type of code execution vulnerabilities to launch Drive-by Download attacks.

The remaining issues cover less severe information disclosure vulnerabilities.

If you'd like to know more about the technical differences between these flaws, see the "Vulnerability Information" section of Microsoft's bulletin. Technical differences aside, the memory corruption flaws in IE pose significant risk. You should download and install the IE cumulative patch immediately.

· MS11-052: IE (and Windows) VML Code Execution Flaw

IE also suffers from a memory corruption vulnerability having to do with how it parses specially crafted Vector Markup Language (VML) that references uninitialized or deleted objects. By enticing one of your users to a specially crafted web page, an attacker could leverage this flaw to execute code on that user's computer, with their privileges. As usual, if the victim has local administrative privilege, the attacker gains complete control of the victim's computer. This flaw is similar in scope to previous VML IE flaws, like the one we demonstrate in this old Wire video.

Keep in mind, today's attackers commonly hijack legitimate web pages and booby-trap them with malicious code. Typically, they do this via hosted web ads or through SQL injection and XSS attacks. Even recognizable and authentic websites could pose a risk to your users if hijacked in this way.

Solution Path:

These patches fix serious issues. You should download, test, and deploy the appropriate IE patches immediately, or let Windows Automatic Update do it for you.

MS11-050:

· Internet Explorer 6.0

o For Windows XP (w/SP3)

o For Windows XP x64 (w/SP2)

o For Windows Server 2003 (w/SP2)

o For Windows Server 2003 x64 (w/SP2)

o For Windows Server 2003 Itanium (w/SP2)

· Internet Explorer 7.0

o For Windows XP (w/SP3)

o For Windows XP x64 (w/SP2)

o For Windows Server 2003 (w/SP2)

o For Windows Server 2003 x64 (w/SP2)