October Black Tuesday Overview

Published: 2008-10-14. Last Updated: 2008-10-14 22:43:03 UTC
by Swa Frantzen (Version: 1)

Overview of the October 2008 Microsoft patches and their status.

#	Affected	Contra Indications	Known Exploits	Microsoft rating	ISC rating(*)
#	Affected	Contra Indications	Known Exploits	Microsoft rating	clients	servers
MS08-056	Cross site scripting (XSS) in the way Office XP SP3 handles the dialog window for the content-disposition:download and the cdo: protocol.
MS08-056	Office CVE-2008-4020	KB 957699	No publicly known exploits	Moderate	Important	Less Urgent
MS08-057	Multiple vulnerabilities in Excel lead to random code execution. This also affect sharepoint server. Replaces MS08-043.
MS08-057	Office CVE-2008-4019 CVE-2008-3471 CVE-2008-3477	KB 956416	No publicly known exploits	Critical	Critical	Critical (**)
MS08-058	Multiple vulnerabilities in MSIE lead to random code execution and or information leaks. Replaces MS08-045.
MS08-058	IE CVE-2008-2947 CVE-2008-3472 CVE-2008-3473 CVE-2008-3474 CVE-2008-3475 CVE-2008-3476	KB 956390	CVE-2008-2947 is publicly known	Critical	Critical	Important
MS08-059	RPC requests can bypass authentication and lead to random code execution.
MS08-059	Host Integration Server (HIS) CVE-2008-3466	KB 956695	No publicly known exploits	Critical	Important	Critical
MS08-060	A buffer overflow in the LDAP services allows random code execution. LDAP over SSL is also afected. Replaces MS08-035.
MS08-060	Windows active directory CVE-2008-4023	KB 957280	No publicly known exploits	Critical	N/A	Critical
MS08-061	Multiple vulnerabilities in the windows kernel allow privilege escalation. Replaces MS08-025.
MS08-061	Windows kernel CVE-2008-2250 CVE-2008-2251 CVE-2008-2252	KB 954211	No publicly known exploits	Important	Important	Important (***)
MS08-062	An Interger overflow in IPP allows random code execution to authenticated users.
MS08-062	Windows internet printing (IIS) CVE-2008-1446	KB 953155	Actively exploited in targeted attacks	Important	Less Urgent (****)	Critical
MS08-063	Crafted filenames lead to random code execution in the SMB protocol. Replaces MS06-063.
MS08-063	Windows file sharing CVE-2008-4038	KB 957095	No publicly known exploits	Important	Important	Critical
MS08-064	An integer overflow allows privilege escalation. Replaces MS07-066, MS07-022 and Advisory 932596.
MS08-064	Windows virtual address descriptor CVE-2008-4036	KB 956841	No publicly known exploits	Important	Important	Important
MS08-065	An input validation failure in an RPC of MSQS allows random code execution.
MS08-065	Windows 2000 message queuing CVE-2008-3479	KB 951071	No publicly known exploits	Important	Important	Important
MS08-066	An input validation failure allows privilege escalation.
MS08-066	Windows ancillary function driver CVE-2008-3464	KB 956803	No publicly known exploits	Important	important	Less Urgent (***)
Advisory 956391	Killbits for 3rd party (Microgaming, System Requirements Lab, PhotostockPro) as well as Microsoft ActiveX controls mentioned in MS02-044, MS08-017, MS08-041 and MS08-052.
Advisory 956391	IE Active X killbits	KB 956391		-	Critical	Important

We will update issues on this page for about a week or so as they evolve.
We appreciate updates
US based customers can call Microsoft for free patch related support on 1-866-PCSAFETY

(*): ISC rating

We use 4 levels:
- PATCH NOW: Typically used where we see immediate danger of exploitation. Typical environments will want to deploy these patches ASAP. Workarounds are typically not accepted by users or are not possible. This rating is often used when typical deployments make it vulnerable and exploits are being used or easy to obtain or make.
- Critical: Anything that needs little to become "interesting" for the dark side. Best approach is to test and deploy ASAP. Workarounds can give more time to test.
- Important: Things where more testing and other measures can help.
- Less Urgent: Typically we expect the impact if left unpatched to be not that big a deal in the short term. Do not forget them however.
The difference between the client and server rating is based on how you use the affected machine. We take into account the typical client and server deployment in the usage of the machine and the common measures people typically have in place already. Measures we presume are simple best practices for servers such as not using outlook, MSIE, word etc. to do traditional office or leisure work.
The rating is not a risk analysis as such. It is a rating of importance of the vulnerability and the perceived or even predicted threat for affected systems. The rating does not account for the number of affected systems there are. It is for an affected system in a typical worst-case role.
Only the organization itself is in a position to do a full risk analysis involving the presence (or lack of) affected systems, the actually implemented measures, the impact on their operation and the value of the assets involved.
All patches released by a vendor are important enough to have a close look if you use the affected systems. There is little incentive for vendors to publicize patches that do not have some form of risk to them.