Are you secure? Check again.

Microsoft is scrambling to stomp a new armada of nasties, including a killer flaw in XP/Vista that exposes your innards to miscreants by simply going online. The plot stinks: a hacker simply broadcasts rogue TC/IP packets to a stream of addresses (including yours). That’s the usual modus operandi, but it goes a step further. These rogue packets then ventures on to trick their way into your Windows core and hijack your PC, transforming it into a mindless zombie for a gargantuan botnet. Before you know it, your innocent PC is churning out spam to viagra sites. Or manufacturing self-replicating worms. Damn.

According to news I’ve read, one programmer demonstrated the proof-of-concept at a community college on a fully patched XP system. Defenses crumbled in a flash. Scary?

Don’t fret. Windows already has a patch to address this solution. If you value your security, I suggest you grab it now:

VISTA DOWNLOAD:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=23c0e03a-db66-4618-bce0-af55e5c1b067&displaylang=en

XP DOWNLOAD:

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0a766242-2342-4fa0-9b66-8953c54a2211

Here’s a snippet of  Microsoft warning:

Executive Summary

This critical security update resolves two privately reported vulnerabilities in Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) processing. 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.

This is a critical security update for all supported editions of Windows XP and Windows Vista, an important security update for all supported editions of Windows Server 2003, and a moderate security update for all supported editions of Microsoft Windows 2000. For more information, see the subsection, Affected and Non-Affected Software, in this section.

This security update addresses the vulnerability by modifying the way that the Windows kernel processes TCP/IP structures that contain multicast and ICMP requests. For more information about the vulnerability, see the Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) subsection for the specific vulnerability entry under the next section, Vulnerability Information.

Recommendation. Microsoft recommends that customers apply the update immediately

Subscribe To RSS Feed Updates (What is RSS??)

Bookmark & Share

Related Posts

• SP1 or KB938194 = a Ferarri PC!
• Microsoft Push Email service - The end of Blackberries?
• New Version Of Windows Vista Advisor Launched Today
• Do You Really Need To Upgrade To Vista At A Cost Of $450?
• Microsoft Launching Music And Video Download Services?
• Which Anti-Virus Software To Use With Windows Vista
• Turning Off Low Disk Space Warning In Vista