Microsoft Security Bulletin: February 2015 Release!

Welcome to another round of security updates! Please see the table for this month's list of updates that you need to consider in your environments.

Bulletin ID

Bulletin Title and Executive Summary

Maximum Severity Rating and Vulnerability Impact

Restart Requirement

Affected Software

MS15-009

Security Update for Internet Explorer (3034682) This security update resolves one publicly disclosed and forty privately reported vulnerabilities in Internet Explorer. The most severe of these vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user views a specially crafted webpage using Internet Explorer. An attacker who successfully exploited these vulnerabilities could gain the same user rights as the current user. Customers whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than those who operate with administrative user rights.

Critical Remote Code Execution

Requires restart

Microsoft Windows,Internet Explorer

MS15-010

Vulnerabilities in Windows Kernel-Mode Driver Could Allow Remote Code Execution (3036220) This security update resolves one publicly disclosed and five privately reported vulnerabilities in Microsoft Windows. The most severe of the vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if an attacker convinces a user to open a specially crafted document or visit an untrusted website that contains embedded TrueType fonts.

Critical Remote Code Execution

Requires restart

Microsoft Windows

MS15-011

Vulnerability in Group Policy Could Allow Remote Code Execution (3000483) This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow remote code execution if an attacker convinces a user with a domain-configured system to connect to an attacker-controlled network. An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could take complete control of an affected system. An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full user rights.

Critical Remote Code Execution

Requires restart

Microsoft Windows

MS15-012

Vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office Could Allow Remote Code Execution (3032328) This security update resolves three privately reported vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office. The vulnerabilities could allow remote code execution if a user opens a specially crafted Microsoft Office file. An attacker who successfully exploited the vulnerabilities could gain the same user rights as the current user. Customers whose accounts are configured to have fewer user rights on the system could be less impacted than those who operate with administrative user rights.

Important Remote Code Execution

May require restart

Microsoft Office

MS15-013

Vulnerability in Microsoft Office Could Allow Security Feature Bypass (3033857) This security update resolves one publicly disclosed vulnerability in Microsoft Office. The vulnerability could allow security feature bypass if a user opens a specially crafted Microsoft Office file. The security feature bypass by itself does not allow arbitrary code execution. However, an attacker could use this security feature bypass vulnerability in conjunction with another vulnerability, such as a remote code execution vulnerability, to run arbitrary code.

Important Security Feature Bypass

May require restart

Microsoft Office

MS15-014

Vulnerability in Group Policy Could Allow Security Feature Bypass (3004361) This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow security feature bypass if an attacker, by way of a man-in-the-middle attack, causes the Group Policy Security Configuration Engine policy file on a targeted system to become corrupted or otherwise unreadable. This results in the Group Policy settings on the system to revert to their default, and potentially less secure, state.

Important Security Feature Bypass

Requires restart

Microsoft Windows

MS15-015

Vulnerability in Microsoft Windows Could Allow Elevation of Privilege (3031432) This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow an attacker to leverage the lack of impersonation-level security checks to elevate privileges during process creation. An authenticated attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could acquire administrator credentials and use them to elevate privileges. An attacker could then install programs; view, change, or delete data; or create new accounts with full administrative rights.

Important Elevation of Privilege

Requires restart

Microsoft Windows

MS15-016

Vulnerability in Microsoft Graphics Component Could Allow Information Disclosure (3029944) This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Microsoft Windows. The vulnerability could allow information disclosure if a user browses to a website containing a specially crafted TIFF image. This vulnerability would not allow an attacker to execute code or to elevate their user rights directly, but it could be used to obtain information that could be used to try to further compromise the affected system.

Important Information Disclosure

May require restart

Microsoft Windows

MS15-017

Vulnerability in Virtual Machine Manager Could Allow Elevation of Privilege (3035898) This security update resolves a privately reported vulnerability in Virtual Machine Manager (VMM). The vulnerability could allow elevation of privilege if an attacker logs on an affected system. An attacker must have valid Active Directory logon credentials and be able to log on with those credentials to exploit the vulnerability.

Important Elevation of Privilege

Requires restart

Microsoft Server Software

Have a great weekend!

Jeffa