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Zero-day WMF flaw underscores patch problems
Robert Lemos, SecurityFocus 2006-01-12

For four days in January, network administrators and security-savvy home users had a choice: Download and install an unofficial open-source fix for the critical flaw in the Windows Meta File (WMF) format or wait an estimated week for an official patch from Microsoft.

Comments Mode:
What Microsoft needs to be doing... 2006-01-12
Eric (2 replies)
Re: What Microsoft needs to be doing... 2006-01-13
Matthew Murphy (1 replies)
Alternative solution 2006-01-13
mxb (2 replies)
Re: Alternative solution 2006-01-13
DSMatthews
Re: Alternative solution 2006-01-13
Anonymous
The problem with that is, sometimes a patch can cause other problems (i.e. breaking other software, corrupting databases, rather soundly screwing up user account, and the list goes on). It's best to be sure you aren't creating more problems before releasing the patch. Sometimes the additional problems can be more damaging than the original attack (simply because techs download the patch whether they have been attacked or not, so the effect of the patch is more widespread than the initial attack in most cases, thank God for that this time).

When I first heard of this vuln I thought the internet was going to see a "end of the world" situation. Just imagine if someone had used this to attack the server google uses to store it's images? Can you imagine how many people would have been effected if the main image on google had been replaced by a black hat created image?

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Link to this comment: http://www.securityfocus.com/comments/articles/11368/32959#32959
Make'em pay! 2006-01-13
assurbanipal
The Squander of MS Admins && Users 2006-01-13
Anonymous (1 replies)
Re: The Squander of MS Admins && Users 2006-01-16
Anonymous (1 replies)
Does any one see this 2006-01-13
Anonymous
Patch from Guilfanov was not the only one 2006-01-16
Juha-Matti Laurio







 

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