Microsoft is all set to roll out a hefty set of patches next week under its Patch Tuesday cycle containing fixes for Windows OS, Office productivity suite and Internet Explorer.
In the November 11 update, which is one of the biggest so far from Microsoft for 2014, five of the updates are marked as critical and they affect all versions of Microsoft Windows operating system including Windows 7, Windows 8, Windows RT, and Windows Server. One of the critical update also affect all versions of Internet explorer from versions 7 through 11.
If we go by the definition of a critical update according to Microsoft, it is that patch that plugs holes or vulnerabilities, which if exploited “could allow code execution without user interaction”. This Microsoft says include scenarios such as “self-propagating malware (e.g. network worms), or unavoidable common use scenarios where code execution occurs without warnings or prompts.”
Nine of the updates are market important and they are to do with Windows, Office, .NET framework, Exchange and Windows server operating system.
The important updates are for those vulnerabilities that are not as severe as the critical ones, but they should be installed so that you can keep you computer protected.
There are some patches that actually address vulnerabilities in a few products only. Consider for example bulletin 6 pertains – this pertains to Microsoft Office 2007 exclusively, while Bulletin 10 affects components of SharePoint Foundation 2010 SP2 only and finally Bulletin 12 affects only Microsoft Exchange Server versions 2007, 2010 and 2013.
Those who have automatic updates enabled, shouldn’t find the update process too painful except for a restart; however, IT administrators are advised that they test the updates before rolling them out on production servers so as to avoid any undesired downtime if the update process goes wrong or gives rise to incompatibility issues.
