What’s New

Tech News – Not a lot going on in tech news other than we’re still seeing a lot of the FBI / DHS / <insert random scary sounding acronym here> virus as a result of drive by downloads.  As always, keep an eye on our Facebook Page and support center for up-to-date news and info.

Updates

Microsoft – According to the Advanced Notification, there are 8 bulletins this month including 4 critical and 4 important.  All of the 4 critical bulletins address remote code vulnerabilities and affect Windows (all 4), Internet Explorer and .NET.  The remaining 4 important bulletins address problems with Windows, Windows Server, Office and Silverlight, 3 of which are remote code execution vulnerabilities.

Microsoft releases regular updates the second Tuesday of each month, often referred to as ‘Patch Tuesday’.  These updates are categorized as Low, Moderate, Important or Critical.  Details on the categories is available here.  The updates can include any *supported* Microsoft product from Windows (Windows XP, Windows 7, Windows Vista, Windows 8, Windows Server, etc.) to Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Publisher, OneNote, and even MS Office for Mac) to Internet Explorer to server products like Exchange, SQL Server and more.  If you have one of these products installed, especially if the update is listed as Important or Critical, it’s important that the update be installed. 

Additional details are available from Microsoft here.  

 

Adobe – The biggest news in the Adobe camp today has to be the breach that we reported earlier tonight but there are also some relatively (in light of the breach) issues with Adobe Reader noted in the link below.  One thing to keep in mind is that, as a result of the breach, attackers now know details about a significant number of Adobe customers.  Expect to see phishing attacks as a result and beware. 

Like Microsoft, Adobe now releases updates to their products on the second Tuesday of each month.  Adobe will also release ‘out of band’ updates if necessary to address critical vulnerabilities in their products.  Adobe products include Adobe Reader (for viewing PDF files), Adobe Flash Player (often used to watch videos like YouTube and in interactive web content like games) and Adobe Shockwave.  

Additional details and downloads are available from Adobe here. 

 

 

Java – As of the time of this writing, things are relatively quiet in the Java camp.  This is a welcome change.  The latest update is Java 7 update 40.  Some things to remember is that Oracle is now, as a part of the installation / update process, removing older versions of Java.  

Java is a tool that’s widely used by Banks, online service providers and even security companies for VPN connections.  Java’s ‘official’ release cycle is approximately quarterly but Java updates have been ‘fast and furious’ for the past several months.  It’s worth noting again that, if you don’t absolutely need Java on your computer, it’s worth removing it altogether (this can be done from Add / Remove programs). 

Additional details and downloads are available from Oracle here.     
 

 

 

Monthly Update Clients
* If you are not currently taking advantage of our monthly update service and would like more information or to sign up, additional information is available here. 
 
For our Monthly Update clients, if a date and time hasn’t already been scheduled to install your updates, we will be contacting you shortly to schedule.   

If you aren’t already taking advantage of our monthly update service, there’s no time like the present to get started.  We offer a monthly update service to keep all of your computers up-to-date for a low monthly fixed price with no long-term commitment.  Additional information is available on our website.