14 DAY TRIAL // Are you tired of botched update this month? We are too, but by the looks of things, there’s so much more to report on this front.
The most recent broken update discovered and this time confirmed by Microsoft is KB4011730, which appears to be causing issues with DOCX documents when launched with Microsoft Word 2016.
First things first. As Microsoft itself explains, KB4011730 is a security update for Microsoft Office 2016 that comes to address “vulnerabilities that could allow remote code execution if a user opens a specially crafted Office file.”
And while the update was originally supposed to repair the problem and let you open DOCX documents without any security risk involved, it looks like it actually addresses the issue by not letting you open DOCX files at all in Microsoft Word 2016.
Microsoft itself has confirmed the bug and says that “after you install this security update, you may be unable to open or save a Word document.”
How to fix the bug
The workaround, according to the software giant itself, is to install the March 6, 2018 update for Office 2016 (KB4018295), which ironically, was released before the March 13 Word 2016 update. So to fix a bug introduced by a new patch you need to install an old patch.
The issue is discussed in detail on TechNet where users confirm that removing KB4011730 completely also restores the DOCX document functionality in Microsoft Word 2016.
“We have the same issue in our organization with this same KB and removing the patch resolves it right away. Unfortunately since MS automatically installs it, we have to use the hide updates tool to block it temporarily,” one user says.
A Microsoft engineer said in a reply posted to the linked discussion that the company is investigating the issue and will provide further information when it’s ready. In the meantime, you can install the patch mentioned above to work with DOCX documents in Word 2016.