Even though there are no ‘Zero Day’ vulnerabilities, July’s Patch Tuesday is far from boring. So far, we have Adobe releasing updates for Adobe Flash, Acrobat and Reader. Additionally, Microsoft is releasing 11 updates, six of which are critical. In upcoming news, Oracle is due to have its quarterly Critical Patch Update release next Tuesday, July 19th. We also have the one year anniversary of Server 2003 end of life on July 14th, and it looks like the anniversary update for Windows 10 is slated for August 2nd – although the Insider build looks like it may have just stabilized on 1607 this week.

Starting with Adobe, they have released two bulletins. The first was preannounced last week as APSB16-26, which is a Priority 1 update resolving 30 vulnerabilities. As a reminder, the last Acrobat\Reader update was in May, which was also a priority two with 82 vulnerabilities resolved.

Flash player also has an update this month. APSB16-25 is a Priority 1 update resolving 52 vulnerabilities, the worst of which would allow an attacker to take full control of the affected system. If you recall last month, Adobe announced a ‘Zero Day’ on June’s Patch Tuesday, but released APSB16-18 on June 16th, along with 35 other CVEs. With that said, if you have not updated Flash Player in a while, you’ll want to put extra emphasis on updating this month ASAP.

Oracle’s Quarterly Critical Patch Update will be coming down the pipeline later this month, and is scheduled for next Tuesday, July 19th.  Be on the lookout for a Critical Java release and plan to include it in your monthly patch maintenance.

Microsoft’s release this month includes six critical updates and five important ones. This month, Microsoft is reporting two public disclosures and is resolving 41 distinct vulnerabilities.

First, let’s talk browser updates: MS16-084 for Internet Explorer is rated critical and fixes 15 vulnerabilities. MS16-085 for Edge is also rated critical and fixes 13 vulnerabilities. Both updates include vulnerabilities that are user targeted, meaning an attacker would be able to exploit a user through specially crafted content. These updates also include several vulnerabilities that can be mitigated by proper privilege management, meaning, if a user who clicks on the specially crafted content is a full admin, the attacker will have full control over the target system.

MS16-086 is a cumulative update for Jscript and VBscript. The bulletin is rated critical and resolves vulnerabilities that are user targeted and mitigated by proper privilege management. This is a continuation of a bulletin chain dating all the way back to MS10-022 and released in April 2010.  The replacement chain is nine deep, and back in December 2015, Microsoft changed the title from “Vulnerability in VBScript Scripting Engine Could Allow Remote Code Execution” to “Cumulative Security Update for JScript and VBScript to Address Remote Code Execution.”  The last three in the chain appeared in consecutive Patch Tuesdays from May to July 2016.  It seems a cumulative Jscript\VBScript update may be a fairly regular addition to Patch Tuesdays, so keep an eye out for that.

MS18-087 addresses two vulnerabilities in Windows Print Spooler that could allow for Remote Code Execution and Elevation of Privilege attacks, if the attacker is able to perform a man-in-the-middle attack on either a workstation or print server, or by setting up a rogue print server on a target network.

MS16-088 addresses seven vulnerabilities in Microsoft Office and SharePoint. This update is also rated critical and includes vulnerabilities that are user targeted, and some that can be mitigated by proper Privilege Management. The vulnerabilities could allow Remote Code Execution if a user opens a specially crafted office document. An attack could come in the form of an email attachment or through hosted web content. On SharePoint, the vulnerabilities appear to only allow for Information Disclosure by documentation, provided by Microsoft, and the rating drops to important for SharePoint and Web Apps components. Thus, the urgency is lessened somewhat for those products.

MS16-093 is the last of Microsoft’s critical bulletins this month. This is the Flash Plug-in for IE update. It resolves the 52 vulnerabilities included in APSB16-25, and should be a high priority this month, along with the other Microsoft critical updates.

In addition to the critical updates, there are two important updates this month that warrant special mention. MS16-092 and MS16-094 both include Public Disclosures, meaning they have a vulnerability included that has already leaked enough information to the public to allow an attacker to gain a head start on developing an exploit. As a result, this puts these vulnerabilities at higher risk of being exploited.

MS16-092 (CVE-2016-3272) is an important update in the Windows Kernel on 8.1, and later editions, that could allow a Security Feature Bypass. Likewise, MS16-094 (CVE-2016-3287) is a vulnerability in Secure Boot on the same platforms that could allow for Security Feature Bypass. In both cases, an attacker would need to either use an additional exploit (MS16-092) or have full administrative privileges or physical access to the system (MS16-094), making these two bulletins tougher nuts to crack.

This wraps up our early analysis of the July Patch Tuesday Bulletins.  For more detail join us tomorrow for our regular Patch Tuesday webinar.