Severe Windows 10 Vulnerabilities Fixed Ahead of Patch Tuesday

Microsoft released an out-of-band update for Windows 10 to patch a couple of high-severity vulnerabilities affecting the Windows Codecs Library that would allow attackers to execute arbitrary code.

Windows 10 users are used to getting major updates during Patch Tuesdays, which comes once a month. The current cycle is scheduled to land on July 14, but sometimes the problems are so severe that developers hurry patches along.

A patch can also be pushed ahead of time when major vulnerabilities are found to be actively exploited in the wild. Microsoft does say that it”s not currently exploited in the wild, but the fact that they could potentially impact hundreds of millions of Windows 10 versions, from all over the world, is reason enough for a quick patch.

“A remote code execution vulnerability exists in the way that Microsoft Windows Codecs Library handles objects in memory,” reads the advisory. “An attacker who successfully exploited this vulnerability could obtain information to further compromise the user”s system. Exploitation of the vulnerability requires that a program process a specially crafted image file.”

The issue is all the more problematic for users because there are no known mitigations for the CVE-2020-1425 and CVE-2020-1457 vulnerabilities, meaning that the only way to ensure protection is to install the patches.

The biggest issue with vulnerabilities that affect such a wide range of users is that, one or two years from now, a considerable number of devices will still be vulnerable because they haven”t applied the patch.

The security update is being rolled out through the Microsoft Store, which means that it doesn”t require the user”s input, allowing the patch to reach many more people than through regular channels.