All news with #microsoft tag

🔒 Microsoft will now pay bounties for critical vulnerabilities that directly impact any of its online services, whether the flawed code is Microsoft-owned, third-party, or open source. Announced by Tom Gallagher at Black Hat Europe, the change makes all current and newly launched Microsoft online services in-scope by default. The move aims to steer researcher attention to high-risk areas and accelerate remediation. Microsoft said it paid over $17 million to security researchers in the past year.

🔒 A new variant of the ClickFix social‑engineering technique, called ConsentFix, abuses the Azure CLI OAuth flow to hijack Microsoft accounts without passwords or MFA. Discovered by Push Security, the campaign lures targets via compromised high‑ranking websites and a fake Cloudflare Turnstile CAPTCHA to filter victims. The attack captures an OAuth authorization code returned to a localhost redirect and instructs the user to paste the URL, enabling the attacker to exchange the code for an Azure CLI access token and take control of the account.

⚠️Microsoft has issued a fix for a known bug that caused File Explorer to briefly flash white when launched or navigated in dark mode after installing the optional KB5070311 update. The behavior also occurred when opening a new tab, toggling the Details pane, selecting 'More details' during file copy, or moving to/from Home or Gallery. Microsoft says the December cumulative KB5072033 update resolves the issue and includes related stability and PowerShell warnings.

🔔 Microsoft is introducing an External Domains Anomalies Report for Microsoft Teams to analyze messaging trends and surface suspicious interactions with external domains. The tool will flag sharp spikes in activity, communications with new domains, and abnormal engagement patterns to give administrators early visibility into potential data-sharing or security risks. Microsoft plans a worldwide rollout to standard multi-tenant web environments in February 2026, though licensing implications remain unspecified. The change complements other Teams protections such as malicious-link warnings, false-positive reporting, meeting screen-capture blocking, and desktop performance improvements.

⚠️ Microsoft has released patches for three zero-day vulnerabilities in its December update, including an actively exploited kernel elevation-of-privilege in the Windows Cloud Files Mini Filter Driver (CVE-2025-62221). Two additional zero-days—an RCE in PowerShell (CVE-2025-54100) and an RCE in GitHub Copilot for JetBrains (CVE-2025-64671)—were publicly disclosed but not observed in the wild. Security experts warn attackers could chain the kernel flaw with other exploits to achieve full system or domain compromise.

🛡️ Microsoft released December 2025 patches addressing 56 Windows vulnerabilities, three rated Critical and 53 Important. The update fixes 29 privilege-escalation flaws, 18 remote code execution bugs and other defects, and includes two zero-days and one actively exploited use-after-free (CVE-2025-62221) in the Cloud Files Mini Filter Driver. Administrators are urged to prioritize the KEV-listed fix and follow vendor guidance for mitigation and monitoring.

🚨 Microsoft’s December Patch Tuesday delivers 57 fixes, but an actively exploited zero-day in Windows Cloud Files Mini Filter Driver (CVE-2025-62221) requires immediate remediation. The flaw is a low-complexity use-after-free escalation-of-privilege that can enable a local foothold to become full system compromise. Security teams should prioritize this patch, enforce least-privilege controls, and enhance monitoring where rapid patching isn't possible.

🛡️ Microsoft released its December 2025 Patch Tuesday addressing 57 vulnerabilities, two labeled as critical and the remainder as important. Cisco Talos notes Microsoft assessed exploitation of the two critical issues as less likely, while several important flaws are considered more likely to be attacked. Talos published Snort and Snort 3 rules to detect exploitation attempts and recommends updating firewall SRUs and applying vendor patches promptly.

🛡️ Microsoft released its final Patch Tuesday of 2025, addressing 56 vulnerabilities including one actively exploited zero-day, CVE-2025-62221, and two publicly disclosed bugs. The zero-day is a privilege escalation in the Windows Cloud Files Mini Filter Driver, a core component used by cloud sync services such as OneDrive. Three flaws received Microsoft’s Critical rating, including two Office bugs exploitable via Outlook’s Preview Pane. Administrators should prioritize updates for the flagged privilege escalation issues and apply patches promptly.

⚠ Windows PowerShell 5.1 now displays a security confirmation when using Invoke-WebRequest to fetch web pages, warning that scripts in a downloaded page might run during parsing. The change, delivered with update KB5074204, mitigates a high-severity RCE tracked as CVE-2025-54100 and brings safer parsing behavior from PowerShell 7. Microsoft recommends rerunning commands with the -UseBasicParsing switch or updating automation to include it. Note that the 'curl' alias maps to Invoke-WebRequest and will trigger the same prompt.

🔒 Microsoft has released the KB5071546 extended security update for Windows 10 Enterprise LTSC and systems enrolled in the ESU program, addressing 57 security vulnerabilities including three zero-days. The mandatory patch updates Windows 10 to build 19045.6691 (LTSC 2021 to 19044.6691) and installs automatically, requiring a restart. Notably, it fixes a remote code execution zero-day in PowerShell (CVE-2025-54100) by adding a confirmation prompt and guidance to use -UseBasicParsing with Invoke-WebRequest to avoid parsing embedded scripts.

🔒 Microsoft's December 2025 Patch Tuesday delivers fixes for 57 vulnerabilities, including three zero-day flaws — one actively exploited and two publicly disclosed. The update addresses 19 remote code execution, 28 elevation of privilege, four information disclosure, three denial of service, and two spoofing issues across Windows, PowerShell, Office, Exchange Server and drivers. Administrators should prioritize the actively exploited CVE-2025-62221 and apply vendor patches promptly.

🔔 Microsoft released cumulative updates KB5072033 (25H2/24H2) and KB5071417 (23H2) as the December 2025 Patch Tuesday rollup. The mandatory updates include security fixes, bug patches, and new or enhanced features such as improved File Explorer dark mode, Virtual Workspaces advanced settings, and expanded Full‑Screen Experience for handheld devices. Install via Settings > Windows Update or the Microsoft Update Catalog; features will roll out gradually.

🔍 John Lambert of MSTIC argues defenders should model infrastructure as directed graphs of credentials, entitlements, dependencies and logs so they can trace the attacker’s “red thread.” He introduces the algebras of defense—graphs, relational tables, anomalies, and vectors over time—that let analysts and AI ask domain-specific questions like blast radius or path to crown jewels. Lambert also emphasizes preventative hygiene: asset and entitlement management, deprecating legacy systems, segmentation, and phishing-resistant MFA. He urges collaborative intelligence and AI-enabled tooling to shift advantage back to defenders.

🔒 Security researchers uncovered malicious extensions on the Microsoft Visual Studio Code Marketplace that delivered stealer malware while posing as a dark theme and an AI assistant. Koi Security reported the extensions downloaded additional payloads, captured screenshots, and siphoned emails, Slack messages, Wi‑Fi passwords, clipboard contents and browser sessions to attacker servers. Microsoft removed the packages in early December 2025 after investigators linked them to a publisher using multiple similarly named packages.

🔔 Microsoft’s December 2025 Patch Tuesday addresses 57 CVEs, including one actively exploited Important zero‑day in the Windows Cloud Files Mini Filter Driver and two publicly disclosed Important zero‑days impacting GitHub Copilot for JetBrains and PowerShell. Two Critical RCE flaws in Microsoft Office increase urgency for enterprise patching and remediation. Organizations should prioritize applying Microsoft fixes, adopt layered mitigations where patches are delayed, and use CrowdStrike Falcon dashboards to track affected assets and remediation progress.

🛡️ Two malicious Visual Studio Code extensions on Microsoft's Marketplace, Bitcoin Black and Codo AI, were found delivering an information-stealing payload that can capture screenshots, harvest credentials and crypto wallets, and hijack browser sessions. Published under the developer name 'BigBlack', Codo AI remained live with under 30 downloads at the time of reporting while Bitcoin Black showed a single install. Researchers at Koi Security observed that Bitcoin Black uses a wildcard activation and executes PowerShell or a hidden batch script to download a DLL and executable that leverage DLL hijacking to run the infostealer as 'runtime.exe'.

🤝 Microsoft announced a collaboration with Beazley that designates Microsoft Incident Response as an approved incident response provider for Beazley’s InfoSec and Media Tech policies. This alignment brings technical responders, insurers, brokers, and legal counsel together to accelerate detection, containment, and recovery. Microsoft Incident Response, supported by Microsoft Threat Intelligence and direct engineering access, offers streamlined invoicing aligned to insurance standards. Eligible incident response services used during a cyber event are considered reimbursable, helping customers secure faster claims and recovery.

🔒 Microsoft has been named a Leader in the 2025 Gartner® Magic Quadrant for Email Security, recognizing advances in Microsoft Defender for Office 365. The announcement highlights agentic AI innovations and automated workflows—including an agentic email grading system and the Microsoft Security Copilot Phishing Triage Agent—that reduce manual triage and speed investigations. Microsoft also cites new protections like email bombing detection and expanded coverage across collaboration surfaces such as Microsoft Teams, while committing to greater transparency through in-product benchmarking and reporting.

🔒 In this Deputy CISO blog, Damon Becknel, Microsoft’s VP and Deputy CISO for Regulated Industries, outlines four immediate priorities organizations should act on now. He emphasizes reinforcing essential cyber hygiene—accurate asset inventories, network segmentation, timely patching, MFA, EDR, and proxying email and web traffic—as the most effective means to reduce common intrusions. Becknel also urges adoption of modern standards like phishing-resistant MFA, secure DNS and DMARC, deployment of fingerprinting to track bad actors, and active cross-industry collaboration to share threat signals and raise the cost of attack.