Have you every asked yourself if your computer can be accessed by malicious people that are looking to exploit every vulnerability in your installed programs? Today, I'll give you the answer: if you use Symantec Automated Support Assistant, Symantec Norton AntiVirus 2006, Symantec Norton Internet Security 2006 or Symantec Norton SystemWorks 2006, then you're surely vulnerable to attacks. Security company Secunia published an advisory to inform users about some highly critical security flaws that can allow an attacker to control an affected system. Symantec sustained the vulnerability was discovered in some third-party ActiveX controls developed by SupportSoft but signed by the company that are shipped and installed with the applications mentioned above.

"The SupportSoft ActiveX controls were initially implemented mid-2005 on Symantec's consumer support site. During the timeframe up to August 2006, when the non-vulnerable controls were made available, vulnerable controls could potentially be installed by the Automated Support Assistant on customer systems running Symantec consumer products and versions other than those listed above. See Symantec Response section to determine if your product has a vulnerable version of the Automated Support Assistant fix tool. Symantec Corporate and Enterprise products do not ship with these components and are NOT vulnerable to this issue," Symantec mentioned in a security advisory.

The security company also posted the solution to avoid a successful exploitation of the issue, sustaining all the users of the application must install the patches released by Symantec. The affected customers can also use another easier solution to fix the vulnerability by using the Live Update function included in all the products designed by Symantec. If you want to read the entire security advisory published by the company, you should follow this link. Norton Antivirus was also tested by Softpedia and is available as a free download on this link.