Microsoft Releases Patch For WMF Image Handling

Earlier this week, Microsoft announced that they would have a patch ready to fix the flaw in WMF image handling that has been plaguing the Internet recently, but that it would not be available until January 10, their regular monthly patch release date. Earlier today however, Microsoft released the patch ahead of schedule. According to a letter posted on message boards from Mike Nash, Microsoft Vice President in charge of Security, two things led to the accelerated patch release. "The first is that we have an update that we believe in. The team worked very hard to run all of the key scenarios that we are concerned about. While we would always like to have more time, we are confident in the quality of the update. The second issue is that while there is no imminent threat, a number of customers are seeing exploit traffic hitting their AV, IDS and IPS systems." Customers using Windows Automatic Update should be getting the patch already. For more details, check out the updated Microsoft Security Bulletin Advance Notification bulletin. Microsoft will still release other, less critical patches on the regularly scheduled date next Tuesday.