Microsoft has notified users that cybercriminals are taking advantage of a previously unknown zero-day vulnerability.
This is happening in Windows 10 as well as various Windows Server versions. The exploit might allow unscrupulous people to take control of PCs via compromised websites or malicious Office documents.
“Microsoft is investigating reports of a remote code execution vulnerability in MSHTML that affects Microsoft Windows. Microsoft is aware of targeted attacks that attempt to exploit this vulnerability by using specially-crafted Microsoft Office documents.
An attacker could craft a malicious ActiveX control to be used by a Microsoft Office document that hosts the browser rendering engine. The attacker would then have to convince the user to open the malicious document. 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.
Microsoft Defender Antivirus and Microsoft Defender for Endpoint both provide detection and protections for the known vulnerability. Customers should keep antimalware products up to date. Customers who utilize automatic updates do not need to take additional action. Enterprise customers who manage updates should select the detection build 1.349.22.0 or newer and deploy it across their environments. Microsoft Defender for Endpoint alerts will be displayed as: “Suspicious Cpl File Execution”.
Upon completion of this investigation, Microsoft will take the appropriate action to help protect our customers. This may include providing a security update through our monthly release process or providing an out-of-cycle security update, depending on customer needs.”
Source: Microsoft
Any fixes available?
How to Geek states on their website, “We could see an official fix for the exploit on September 14, 2021, when Microsoft is set to do its next “Patch Tuesday” update. In the meantime, you’ll need to be careful and disable the installation of ActiveX controls in Internet Explorer.”
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