Over the weekend, on April 26, Microsoft released an advisory about an Internet Explorer use-after-free zeroday vulnerability, CVE-2014-1776, that is being exploited in the wild. The vulnerability lies within MSHTML.dll, and affects Internet Explorer 6 through 11. According to FireEye, attacks have been spotted in the wild targeting Internet Explorer 9 through 11. The observed attacks rely on an exploit for Adobe Flash, which targets a now patched vulnerability, CVE-2014-0515. Exploiting the Flash vulnerability allowed attackers to bypass ASLR and DEP (security protection mechanisms).
Microsoft has released an out-of-band patch to address this vulnerability, MS14-021. Install this patch as soon as possible to address this vulnerability.
To mitigate this vulnerability, users are encouraged to apply the following workarounds until the patch can be applied.
• Configure EMET 4.1 or 5.0 to protect Internet Explorer. This was observed to mitigate exploitation of this vulnerability.
• Use Enhanced Protected Mode in IE (available in 10 and higher).
• Upgrade the Flash browser plugin to 13.0.0.206 for Windows/Mac and 11.2.202.356 for Linux.
• If you are unable to upgrade Flash, then disable the Flash browser plugin.
Retina has audits available to detect vulnerable Internet Explorer and Flash player installations:
• 33939 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE6 XP32
• 33940 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE6 XP64/2K3/2K364
• 33941 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE6 XP64/2K364 x64
• 33942 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE7
• 33943 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE7 x64
• 33944 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE8 XP/2003
• 33945 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE8 XP/2003 x64
• 33946 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE8
• 33947 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE8 x64
• 33948 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE9
• 33949 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE9 x64
• 33950 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE10
• 33951 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE10 x64
• 33952 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE11
• 33953 - Microsoft Internet Explorer Use-After-Free (KB2965111) - IE11 x64
• 33877 - Adobe APSB14-13: Flash Player - IE for Windows XP/2003/Vista/2008/7
• 33878 - Adobe APSB14-13: Flash Player - IE for Windows 8/2012/8.1/2012 R2
• 33879 - Adobe APSB14-13: Flash Player - Other Browsers for Windows
• 33880 - Adobe APSB14-13: Flash Player - Linux
• 33881 - Adobe APSB14-13: Flash Player - Mac OS X
Revisions
2014-04-29: Original Post
2014-05-01: Added Notice of Out-Of-Band Patch Release, MS14-021
2014-05-01: Removed Zero-Day audit 33867.
2014-05-01: Added KB2965111 audits.
Scott Lang, Sr. Director, Product Marketing at BeyondTrust
Scott Lang has nearly 20 years of experience in technology product marketing, currently guiding the product marketing strategy for BeyondTrust’s privileged account management solutions and vulnerability management solutions. Prior to joining BeyondTrust, Scott was director of security solution marketing at Dell, formerly Quest Software, where he was responsible for global security campaigns, product marketing for identity and access management and Windows server management.