Patch Tuesday: March, 2010: 2 Patches But No Emergency

Both of this month's patches address vulnerabilities that are likely targets for bad guys to produce exploit code that works consistently although there are no current exploits known. Both Bulletins are rated important and since how-to details for exploiting these vulnerabilities is not yet public and no reports of actual attacks, at this time, we recommend doing your standard testing before deployment. 

MS10-016 impact Movie Maker and Producer. There is no patch for Microsoft Producer, the workarounds are recommended for this product. This means at least disabling the file association. Or at most there is a workaround to prevent Producer from being installed or run. Install the patch for the other products. Windows 7 is in both the affected and non-affected sections. A note indicates that the vulnerability is in an optional download of Movie Maker 2.6 for Windows 7.

MS10-017 addresses 7 vulnerabilities in Office for both Windows and Mac. The workarounds offered, while helpful, do not address all of the vulnerabilities and are not comprehensive for all vectors. Users cannot be relied upon to make the right decision when opening downloaded files. An educational program helps in this area. A virus scan might catch the malicious file if the policy is in force. But we recommend applying the patch for defense-in-depth.
 


BulletinExploit Types
/Technologies Affected
System Types AffectedExploit
details public?
/ Being exploited?
Comprehensive,
practical
workaround
available?
MS severity ratingProducts AffectedNotesRandy's recommendation
MS10-016

975561
Arbitrary code

/ Movie Maker
Workstations
No/NoYesImportant XP
Vista
Windows 7
Producer 2003
Restart may be req'd; No patch for ProducerPatch after testing; Apply workaround(s) for Producer
MS10-017

980150
Arbitrary code

/ Office Excel
Workstations
Terminal Servers
No/NoNoImportant Office XP
Office 2003
Office 2007
Office 2004 for Mac
Office 2008 for Mac
Open XML Format Converter Mac
Excel Viewer
Office Sharepoint Server 2007
Office Converter Pack
Multiple vulnerabilitiesPatch after testing
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