The Microsoft Security Bulletin Advanced Notification for March 2012, known as “Patch Tuesday”, covers six bulletins. One is listed as “critical”, four are listed as “important”, and one bulletin is listed as “moderate”.
Bulletin 1, critical, affects “ALL” organizations AND consumers. Specifically, if affects Windows XP Service Pack 3, Windows Vista, Windows 7, Windows Server 2003, Windows Server 2008, and Windows Server 2008 R2.
The patch for bulletins 1-3 actually changes the Windows Kernel, meaning that a Reboot is required.
Bulletin 4, labeled important, impacts Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 Service Pack 1, Microsoft Visual Studio 2010, and Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1. This bulletin addresses Visual Studio flaw which can result in a privilege escalation.
Bulletin 5, labeled important, addresses remote code execution in Microsoft Expression Design, which is a vector graphics editor that competes with Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. This issue is probably related to malicious file formats that could result in a compromise of system running the software
Bulletin 6, labeled moderate, only affects Windows operating systems post Windows 2003 Server. This means Bulletin 6 addresses issues which were introduced with Windows Vista.
Bottom line: Make sure you reboot your windows computers and servers Wednesday morning.
Greg Allen
Active Technologies, LLC
www.active-technologies.com
gallen@active-technologies.com
843-225-5648