Windows Update Kills Third-Party Applications

Installing an out of band Windows security update may yet prove to be a functionality trade-off that you cannot afford. This is the case of the Microsoft Security Bulletin MS07-017 made available on April 3, 2007, seven days before the scheduled April patch cycle. The security patch is designed to address a range of vulnerabilities in GDI, including the Windows Animated Cursor Handling flaw.

"Since MS07-017 was released out-of-band on Tuesday to protect customers from attacks exploiting the Windows Animated Cursor Handling vulnerability, we wanted to provide additional information regarding an update to the known issue Microsoft Knowledge Base Article 925902 with information that may impact customers," revealed Christopher Budd, MSRC Security program Manager.

Budd also advised customers that have been impacted by the deployment of the MS07-017 security update to make use of the hotfix available. The Redmond Company revealed that MS07-017 will not only impact the Realtek HD Audio Control Panel but also ElsterFormular, TUGZip and CD-Tag. Microsoft will resolve all these issues today.

"While the impact of these issues is clearly not widespread, it is affecting some of our customers. To help customers who have these applications installed, we will be releasing the hotfix that resolves this issue hotfix to affected customers through Windows Update (WU), Microsoft Update (MU), and Automatic Updates (AU) as part of the Tuesday April 10, 2007 release as a High Priority non-security update," Budd added.

Later today, the Redmond Company will release a total of five security bulletins designed to patch vulnerabilities across Windows and Microsoft Content Management Server. Microsoft did not inform if any of the security updates will impact Windows Vista.