Patch Tuesday July 2017

July’s Patch Tuesday resolves 54 vulnerabilities with 19 rated "Critical", 32 rated "Important" and 3 rated "Moderate". Aside from the typical IE, Edge, and Office vulnerabilities, a new product makes its way into the Patch Tuesday scene: HoloLens, Microsoft’s “mixed-reality smartglasses.”

Windows Search

Windows Search is returning for its second Patch Tuesday in a row, as it appears with a vulnerability that could allow for elevation of privilege. The vulnerability revolves around corruption of memory objects when Windows Search is supplied with malicious input. An attacker who successfully exploited the vulnerability could potentially be able to install programs, view, change or delete user data, or create user accounts with full privileges. This vulnerability has been rated Critical by Microsoft.

Windows Kernel

The Windows Kernel has been patched for multiple Information Disclosure vulnerabilities. While these vulnerabilities themselves do not compromise the victim system, they do provide information that could aid an attacker’s ongoing compromise of a system. As usual, the vulnerability revolves around improper initialization of objects in kernel memory. Microsoft has rated this vulnerability as Important.

Office

This time Office was not quite as teeming as it usually is, but it did come bearing vulnerabilities to be patched. These vulnerabilities could allow for an attacker to execute code remotely on the victim’s system with privileges equal to that of the victim user. This serves as a persistent reminder to be cautious about opening documents from untrusted sources. Microsoft rates these vulnerabilities as Important.

Internet Explorer and Edge

Microsoft’s web browsers make their usual appearance, hosting multiple memory corruption vulnerabilities in javascript. An attacker who exploited these vulnerabilities by luring the user to view malicious content would be able to remotely execute commands on the victim’s system, view memory contents, and create user accounts with privileges equal to that of the victim user. Microsoft rates the most severe of these vulnerabilities as Critical.

.NET Framework

Returning to the spotlight, .NET comes bearing a vulnerability that allows for remote code execution. When parsing a maliciously crafted embedded font, the Windows font library would mishandle the font and allow for an attacker to install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights. Additionally, the .NET Framework would fail to properly validate input before loading a library, allowing an attacker to take control of an affected system. Microsoft has rated the first vulnerability as Critical, and the second as Important.

Microsoft Exchange Server

Exchange comes this Patch Tuesday bearing three vulnerabilities. The first two vulnerabilities allow for Cross-Site-Scripting in Outlook-Web-Access when it fails to properly handle web requests. The third allows for an attacker to spoof a legitimate site, which would make it easier for the attacker to trick the user into entering sensitive information into the fake website, including credentials. These updates are rated as Important and Moderate respectively.

Adobe Flash Player

Adobe Flash Player returns with three vulnerabilities. These vulnerabilities have an impact of allowing for a remote attacker to be able to execute code remotely, read memory addresses, and obtain system information. These vulnerabilities are rated Critical by Microsoft.

Microsoft Hololens

Everyone loves their flashy new VR headsets, right? Well Microsoft is releasing a patch for a previously publicly known vulnerability that had not yet been exploited for the Hololens. An attacker could send specially crafted Wi-Fi packet that causes code to be executed remotely. This vulnerability requires no authentication at all, and would afford the attacker system privileges. Microsoft rates this vulnerability as Critical.

Windows Explorer

Windows Explorer might not seem like the most obvious attack vector, but it has come bearing a vulnerability that could be exploited via social engineering. An attacker could attempt to lure a victim into unintentionally opening a malicious executable that would allow for remote code execution. The code would execute with the same privileges as the user, so less privileged users would be less affected by this vulnerability. Microsoft has rated this vulnerability as Important.