Security

Microsoft on Tuesday released its September 2008 security bulletin summary.

The four bulletins concern Windows GDI+, Windows Media Player, and Microsoft Office OneNote. All are rated critical by Microsoft. There is no cumulative patch for Internet Explorer this month.

Starting next month, Microsoft plans to share the technical details of new vulnerabilities to give software developers time to update affected products before the public announcement.

Also in October, Microsoft will start providing each bulletin with an Exploitability Index to help system administrators prioritize the patches. All current Microsoft security patches for both Windows and Office software are available via Microsoft Update or the individual bulletins detailed below.

MS08-052: Critical
Entitled "Vulnerabilities in GDI+ Could Allow Remote Code Execution (954593)," this bulletin affects all supported editions of Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, Windows Vista, and Windows Server 2008, Microsoft Internet Explorer 6 Service Pack 1 when installed on Microsoft Windows 2000 Service Pack 4, Microsoft Digital Image Suite 2006, SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services Service Pack 2, all supported editions of SQL Server 2005, Microsoft Report Viewer 2005 Service Pack 1 Redistributable Package, and Microsoft Report Viewer 2008 Redistributable Package. It addresses the issues detailed in CVE-2008-5348, CVE-2008-3012, CVE-2008-3013, CVE-2008-3014, and CVE-2008-3015. Microsoft says these vulnerabilities "could allow remote code execution, if a user viewed a specially crafted image file using affected software or browsed a Web site that contains specially crafted content."

MS08-053: Critical
Entitled "Vulnerability in Windows Media Encoder 9 Could Allow Remote Code Execution (954156)," this bulletin affects all supported and affected editions of Microsoft Windows 2000, Windows XP, and Windows Vista, as well as supported and affected versions of Windows Server 2003 and Windows Server 2008. It addresses the vulnerability detailed in CVE-2008-3008. Microsoft says the vulnerability could "allow remote code execution, if a user viewed a specially crafted Web page. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system."

MS08-054: Critical
Entitled "Vulnerability in Windows Media Player Could Allow Remote Code Execution (954154)," this bulletin affects all supported and affected editions of Windows Media Player 11. This bulletin addresses the issues detailed in CVE-2008-2253. Microsoft says there is a "vulnerability in Windows Media Player that could allow remote code execution when a specially crafted audio file is streamed from a Windows Media server. If a user is logged on with administrative user rights, an attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system."

MS08-055: Critical
Entitled "Vulnerability in Microsoft Office Could Allow Remote Code Execution (955047)," this bulletin affects supported editions of Microsoft Office OneNote 2007 and supported editions of Microsoft Office XP, Microsoft Office 2003, and 2007 Microsoft Office System. This bulletin addresses the vulnerability detailed in CVE-2008-3007. Microsoft says "if a user clicks a specially crafted OneNote URL...an attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system."