Microsoft Acknowledges Excel Vulnerability
Microsoft issued a security advisory for an Excel vulnerability that I recently wrote about. The company acknowledged reports of the exploit but has not yet determined the cause, or any fix action as of yet.
Microsoft is investigating new public reports of limited “zero-day†attacks using a vulnerability in Microsoft Excel 2003, Excel Viewer 2003, Excel 2002, Excel 2000, Microsoft Excel 2004 for Mac, and Microsoft Excel v. X for Mac. In order for this attack to be carried out, a user must first open a malicious Excel file attached to an e-mail or otherwise provided to them by an attacker.
In order to avoid the possibility of being compromised by this vulnerability just do not open attachments from untrusted, unreliable authors. This is a best practice that should be followed daily. If you are already weary about opening attachments from unknown senders then you are on the right track.