Microsoft Security Bulletin MS13-068 – Critical: Vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2756473)

Vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook Could Allow Remote Code Execution (2756473)

Executive Summary

This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Outlook. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution if a user opens or previews a specially crafted email message using an affected edition of Microsoft Outlook. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could gain the same user rights as the local user. Users whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than users who operate with administrative user rights.

This security update is rated Critical for all supported editions of Microsoft Outlook 2007 and Microsoft Outlook 2010. For more information, see the subsection, Affected and Non-Affected Software, in this section.

The security update addresses the vulnerability by correcting the way that Microsoft Outlook parses specially crafted S/MIME email messages. For more information about the vulnerabilities, see the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) subsection for the specific vulnerability entry under the next section, Vulnerability Information.

Recommendation. Customers can configure automatic updating to check online for updates from Microsoft Update by using the Microsoft Update service. Customers who have automatic updating enabled and configured to check online for updates from Microsoft Update typically will not need to take any action because this security update will be downloaded and installed automatically. Customers who have not enabled automatic updating need to check for updates from Microsoft Update and install this update manually. For information about specific configuration options in automatic updating, see Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 294871.

For administrators and enterprise installations, or end users who want to install this security update manually, Microsoft recommends that customers apply the update immediately using update management software, or by checking for updates using the Microsoft Update service.

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