Microsoft Patch Tuesday, May 2013

As expected, Microsoft today released its regular monthly batch of security bulletins and associated patches.  This month there are ten bulletins, addressing 32 identified vulnerabilities.    Two bulletins have a Critical severity rating, and the remaining eight are rated Important.   Five of the bulletins are for Windows and its components; every supported version of Windows is affected, and all desktop versions have one or more Critical vulnerabilities.

The remaining five bulletins, all of which are rated Important, apply to other Microsoft software products.   There are three bulletins for Microsoft Office and its components (including Word Viewer).  Microsoft Lync has one bulletin, and there is one for Windows Essentials.

Microsoft says that three of the Windows bulletins will definitely require a system reboot, and the others may require one, depending on the configuration of your system.

For more detailed information, and download links, please see the Microsoft Security Bulletin Summary for May 2013.

As usual, I recommend applying these patches to your systems as soon as you conveniently can.

The handlers at the SANS Internet Storm Center have posted their usual summary and evaluation of this month’s patches.

Update Tuesday, May 14, 14:40 EDT

According to the folks at the SANS Internet Storm Center, one of these bulletins, MS13-038, which applies to Internet Explorer 8, fixes a vulnerability that is being exploited currently.

Microsoft Patch Tuesday Preview, May 2013

In keeping with its usual schedule, Microsoft on Thursday  released the Security Bulletin Advanced Notification for May 2013, previewing the security bulletins and associated patches it intends to release next Tuesday, May 14, 2013.  This month there are ten bulletins in all; two of these have a maximum security rating of Critical; the rest are rated Important.   Five of the bulletins, including both the Critical ones, are for Windows and its components.  All supported desktop versions of Windows have at least one Critical bulletin.  The table below shows a breakdown of the Windows bulletins by severity and Windows version.

Windows Version	Critical	Important	Moderate
Windows XP+SP3	2	2	—
Windows Vista	2	2	—
Windows Server 2003	—	1	2
Windows Server 2008	—	1	2
Windows 7	2	2	—
Windows Server 2008 R2	—	2	2
Windows 8	1	3	—
Windows RT	1	2	1
Windows Server 2012	—	3	1
Windows Server Core	—	3	—

Microsoft says that four of the Windows bulletins will definitely require a restart, and the other bulletins may require one, depending on your system’s configuration.

The remaining five bulletins, all of which are rated Important, apply to other Microsoft software products.   There will be three bulletins that apply to Microsoft Office, one for Lync, and one for Windows Essentials.

As always, this information is subject to change between now and the actual release of the bulletins next Tuesday.  I will post a note here once the actual updates are available.