Microsoft January-2012 Patch Tuesday Released

Microsoft has released seven bulletins covering a total of eight vulnerabilities. Only one issue is rated ‘Critical’ and it affects Windows Media. The remaining issues affect Windows, the kernel and Microsoft’s Anti-Cross Site Scripting library.

The following vulnerabilities are rated “Critical”:

MS12-004 – Vulnerabilities in Windows Media Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2636391)
This security update resolves two privately reported vulnerabilities in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user opens a specially crafted media file. An attacker who successfully exploited the vulnerabilities could gain the same user rights as the local user. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.

The following vulnerabilities are rated “Important”:

MS12-001 – Vulnerability in Windows Kernel Could Allow Security Feature Bypass (2644615)
This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow an attacker to bypass the SafeSEH security feature in a software application. An attacker could then use other vulnerabilities to leverage the structured exception handler to run arbitrary code. Only software applications that were compiled using Microsoft Visual C++ .NET 2003 can be used to exploit this vulnerability.

MS12-002 – Vulnerability in Windows Object Packager Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2603381)
This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution if a user opens a legitimate file with an embedded packaged object that is located in the same network directory as a specially crafted executable file. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could gain the same user rights as the logged-on user. An attacker could then install programs; view, change or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.

MS12-003 – Vulnerability in Windows Client/Server Run-time Subsystem Could Allow Elevation of Privilege (2646524)
This security update resolves one privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. This security update is rated Important for all supported editions of Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008. All supported editions of Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 are not affected by this vulnerability.
The vulnerability could allow elevation of privilege if an attacker logs on to an affected system and runs a specially crafted application. The attacker could then take complete control of the affected system and install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. This vulnerability can only be exploited on systems configured with a Chinese, Japanese or Korean system locale.

MS12-005 – Vulnerability in Microsoft Windows Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2584146)
This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution if a user opens a specially crafted Microsoft Office file containing a malicious embedded ClickOnce application. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could gain the same user rights as the local user. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.

MS12-006 – Vulnerability in SSL/TLS Could Allow Information Disclosure (2643584)
This security update resolves a publicly disclosed vulnerability in SSL 3.0 and TLS 1.0. This vulnerability affects the protocol itself and is not specific to the Windows operating system. The vulnerability could allow information disclosure if an attacker intercepts encrypted web traffic served from an affected system. TLS 1.1, TLS 1.2 and all cipher suites that do not use CBC mode are not affected.

MS12-007 – Vulnerability in AntiXSS Library Could Allow Information Disclosure (2607664)
This security update resolves one privately reported vulnerability in the Microsoft Anti-Cross Site Scripting (AntiXSS) Library. The vulnerability could allow information disclosure if an attacker passes a malicious script to a website using the sanitization function of the AntiXSS Library. The consequences of the disclosure of that information depend on the nature of the information itself. Note that this vulnerability would not allow an attacker to execute code or to elevate the attacker’s user rights directly but it could be used to produce information that could be used to try to further compromise the affected system. Only sites that use the sanitization module of the AntiXSS Library are affected by this vulnerability.

For detailed information of all the bulletins and the corresponding vulnerabilities addressed, please visit,
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/security/bulletin/ms12-jan

We recommend that users set ‘Windows Update’ mode to ‘Install updates automatically’ so that the important patches get applied automatically.

Anand Yadav