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Microsoft Excel fails to properly handle malformed IMDATA records

Vulnerability Note VU#749964

Original Release Date: 2007-01-09 | Last Revised: 2007-01-23

Overview

A vulnerability in the way that Microsoft Excel handles malformed image records could allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code on a vulnerable system.

Description

Microsoft Excel fails to properly validate the size of IMDATA records. When a file containing a malformed IMDATA record is opened in Excel, system memory can be corrupted in a way that may allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code.

More information is available in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-002.

Impact

By convincing a user to open a specially crafted Excel document, an attacker could execute arbitrary code with the privileges of the user running Excel. If the user is logged in with administrative privileges, the attacker could take complete control of a vulnerable system.

Solution

Apply an update from Microsoft
Microsoft addresses this vulnerability with the updates listed in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-002.

Note that Microsoft has re-released the updates in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-002 for Excel 2000. See the Microsoft Security Response Center blog for more information.

Do not open untrusted Excel documents

Do not open unfamiliar or unexpected Excel or other Office documents, particularly those hosted on web sites or delivered as email attachments. Please see Cyber Security Tip ST04-010.

Vendor Information

749964
 

Microsoft Corporation Affected

Notified:  July 11, 2006 Updated: January 09, 2007

Status

Affected

Vendor Statement

We have not received a statement from the vendor.

Vendor Information

The vendor has not provided us with any further information regarding this vulnerability.


CVSS Metrics

Group Score Vector
Base 0 AV:--/AC:--/Au:--/C:--/I:--/A:--
Temporal 0 E:ND/RL:ND/RC:ND
Environmental 0 CDP:ND/TD:ND/CR:ND/IR:ND/AR:ND

References

Acknowledgements

This issue was reported by Jeff Gennari of CERT/CC.

This document was written by Jeff Gennari.

Other Information

CVE IDs: CVE-2007-0027
Severity Metric: 11.48
Date Public: 2007-01-09
Date First Published: 2007-01-09
Date Last Updated: 2007-01-23 17:05 UTC
Document Revision: 25

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