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Microsoft Corp. just issued a heads-up to its clients
concerning the use of Apple Inc.’s Safari Web browser after several reports
were presented about the occurrence of a rather dangerous system intrusion.
Apparently, a flaw found in Apple’s browser, known as the
Safari bug, permits attackers to run unauthorized software on a victim’s
computer and fill its desktop with potentially malicious executable files. The
intrusion is also known as carpet bombing and the dangerous executables appear
to users as normal Windows executables.
The flaw can lead to the complications presented earlier
only combined with an unresolved bug in Internet Explorer. The IE bug has been
reported to Microsoft more than a year ago and the connection with Apple’s flaw
was discovered just last week.
Both the Safari and IE bugs "are moderate
vulnerabilities that, combined, produce a critical flaw, which allows remote
code execution," security researcher Aviv Raff told PCWorld.
Microsoft considers this to be a real threat to its users
and issued a full security advisory three days ago, where it explained the
vulnerability of the system and recommended all Windows users running the
Safari browser to restrict its use until a safer version will be released by
its developers or by Apple’s.
Apple already patched more than 17 vulnerabilities for the
Windows Safari version and, surely, measures for identifying the mechanism’s
full process and removing the bug will be taken as soon as possible.
According to Microsoft’s reports, the flaw affects all
versions of Windows XP and Vista.
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