WatchGuard Wire
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Microsoft disables Indeo codec due to a serious security
vulnerability
9 December 09 -- During yesterday's
Patch Day, Microsoft also quietly released a new Security
Advisory describing a flaw in a popular video codec. The Indeo codec is an old video codec used
to compress video content. The codec was first designed by Intel, later
sold to the Ligos
Corporation, and doesn't get much use today. Nonetheless, an
anonymous security researcher discovered a security vulnerability in
the codec that he reported
to the Zero Day Initiative.
While the flaw technically lies within the Indeo codec, an attacker
could exploit it through Windows Media Player, or even through Internet
Explorer (IE). In short, if an attacker can entice you to a malicious
website, or into downloading and playing a specially crafted movie, he
can exploit this flaw to execute code on your computer, with your
privileges. If you have local administrator privileges, the attacker
gains full control of your PC.
Microsoft has released an update that mitigates the risk of this flaw
by disabling the Indeo codec in IE and Media Player. If you use
Windows' Automatic Update, you will get this update automatically. For
some reason, Microsoft has included this fix in what they consider a
non-security update, even though the issue has significant security
ramifications. If you don't use Automatic Update, you can also read this Microsoft
Knowledge Base article to learn how to "deregister" the Indeo codec
manually. While Microsoft may consider this a non-security update, I
still recommend you apply the fix as soon as you can. --
Corey
Nachreiner,
CISSP
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