Microsoft recently issued a statement warning its users about a serious remote code execution vulnerability ( CVE-2019-1367 ) in its older Internet Explorer browser. The company seems to have taken the dangerous flaw very seriously, as it has released an emergency patch for it .
According to the information released by the company, the RCE vulnerability affects the way Internet Explorer's scripting engine handles memory. It could lead to memory abuse, allowing an attacker to execute malicious code.
By exploiting this vulnerability, attackers can gain the same administrative rights on a system as its regular user. This means that if the user has administrator rights, the attacker will also gain the same rights and be able to do things like install/uninstall applications and even create new users with administrator rights.
Microsoft also said that the vulnerability could also be exploited over the internet, if a hacker tricked a user into visiting a specially crafted malicious website.
If you use Internet Explorer to browse the web, you should install the security update immediately through Windows Update. You can also install the update manually using this link. Affected versions of Windows include Windows 7, Windows 8.1, and Windows 10.
Apart from Microsoft, US Homeland Security has also advised users to install the security updates as soon as possible.
A surprising fact is that 8% of users still use Internet Explorer. Surprisingly, the market share of this browser exceeds that of Apple's Safari and Edge .
In any case, this new flaw gives us yet another reason not to use Internet Explorer and to remove it from our machines immediately. Earlier, another bug discovered in the browser allowed attackers to steal user files, even from those who did not use the browser in question.
