Microsoft Releases “Surprising” Internet Explorer 10 Security Patch

Not a long time ago, Microsoft rolled out the long-awaited security patch to fix Adobe Flash Player bugs in Internet Explorer 10, but the company yesterday released one more security fix aimed at the same buggy media software.

While many Internet users were surprised by the release of a new patch, Microsoft decided to update its Windows 8 browser after Adobe issued an update to fix a total of 25 critical vulnerabilities in Flash Player.

According to a security advisory released by Adobe, 14 of the 25 vulnerabilities were buffer overflow bugs, while the remaining 11 were marked as memory corruption flaws.

The important thing is that all the 25 security glitches could lead to code execution, as the advisory reads.

Getting back to the Internet Explorer 10 update, Microsoft will deliver the patch via the built-in Windows Update feature, so no further action is required.

“Today we released an update that addresses vulnerabilities in Adobe Flash Player in Internet Explorer 10 on Windows 8. The majority of customers have automatic updates enabled and will not need to take any action because the update will be downloaded and installed automatically. For those manually updating, we encourage you to apply this update as quickly as possible,” Vishwac Sena Kannan, program manager, Internet Explorer, said in a statement.

Internet Explorer 10 is only available to Windows 8 users and is the first IE version that comes with a factory-installed Adobe Flash Player plugin.

This means that Microsoft needs to deliver a standalone update for its browser whenever Adobe updates the Flash player, so leaving the automatic Windows updates feature turned on is a must for all Windows 8 users.