Additional technical information that describes the Microsoft Office PowerPoint heap corruption arbitrary code execution vulnerability is publicly available.
Description
Microsoft Office PowerPoint contains a vulnerability that could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on the system with the privileges of the user.
The vulnerability is due to errors in parsing Office PowerPoint files. An unauthenticated, remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability by convincing a user to view a malicious PowerPoint document. If successful, the attacker could execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user.
Microsoft has confirmed the vulnerability in a security bulletin and released software updates.
Warning Indicators
The following Microsoft products are affected:
Office PowerPoint 2002 SP3 and prior Office PowerPoint 2003 SP3 and prior Office 2004 for Mac PowerPoint Viewer SP2 and prior
IntelliShield Analysis
An attacker cannot directly exploit this vulnerability and instead relies on user interaction to accomplish an exploit. The attacker must convince the user to view a malicious document, likely delivered as an attachment to an e-mail message or by convincing the user to follow a link to a document on a remote file share or website.
The Cisco Applied Intelligence team has created an Applied Mitigation Bulletin to address vulnerabilities that Microsoft disclosed in the November 2010 security bulletin release. This Cisco bulletin, which assists administrators in identifying or mitigating these vulnerabilities using Cisco devices, is available at the following link: Cisco Applied Mitigation Bulletin: Microsoft Security Bulletin Release for November 2010
Vendor Announcements
Microsoft has released a security bulletin at the following link: MS10-088
Impact
An unauthenticated, remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability to execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user. If that user holds elevated privileges, the attacker could completely compromise the targeted system.
Technical Information
The vulnerability is in the affected software due to insufficient sanitization of user-supplied input while parsing Microsoft Office PowerPoint documents. The affected software uses an unvalidated parameter to initiate a function iteration while parsing these documents.
An unauthenticated, remote attacker could exploit this vulnerability by convincing a user to view a malicious web page or a document that contains the malformed parameter with an overly large value. The processing of the web page or document could lead to a heap-based buffer overflow condition that corrupts the system memory. The attacker could use the memory corruption to execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user.
Safeguards
Administrators are advised to apply the appropriate software updates.
Users may consider applying the Microsoft Office Isolated Conversion Environment (MOICE) to safely open Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files from suspicious or unrecognized sources on systems that are running Microsoft Office 2003 or Office 2007.
Users are advised not to open e-mail messages from suspicious or unrecognized sources. If users cannot verify that links or attachments included in e-mail messages are safe, they are advised not to open them.
Administrators are advised to monitor critical systems.
Administrators may consider using the Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer (MBSA) scan tool to identify common security misconfigurations and missing security updates on system endpoints.
Patches/Software
Microsoft customers can obtain updates directly by using the links in the security bulletin. These updates are also distributed by Windows automatic update features and available on the Windows Update website. Microsoft Windows Server Update Services (WSUS), Systems Management Server, and System Center Configuration Manager can assist administrators in deploying software updates.
Signatures
Cisco Systems Cisco Intrusion Prevention System (IPS) 6.0
Version 1, November 9, 2010, 1:31 PM: Microsoft Office PowerPoint contains a vulnerability that could allow an unauthenticated, remote attacker to execute arbitrary code on the system with the privileges of the user. Updates are available.
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