May 2014 Patch Tuesday takes place in a few hours and Microsoft is set to roll out eight security patches for various products. Windows XP users will be out of luck this time around as there wont be any updates released for them, even though at least half of the bulletins affect the platform.
The security updates will address vulnerabilities in SharePoint, Internet Explorer, Microsoft Office, and Microsoft Windows. The security fixes for SharePoint and Internet Explorer are rated Critical, while the remainder of the updates are rated Important. Windows 8 and Windows 8.1 are both set to receive one Critical update for Internet Explorer, and three Important updates. Windows RT will receive the same Critical update, but only two Important updates.
Those on Windows XP will be out of luck as none of these security fixes will address vulnerabilities found in Windows XP. The operating system still represents nearly thirty percent of all Windows users.
“The IE critical is the first that clearly would have applied to Windows XP, but for which a patch is not available,” a security analyst at Rapid7 stated. “IE 6, 7, and 8 are vulnerable on Windows 2003 SP2. This would historically have mapped to the same scope of XP patches, but not this time. Anyone still using XP just got a little less secure – not that they were well off to begin with.”
Patch Tuesday takes place later today. Those with Automatic Updates will snag the updates immediately upon release, while the rest of us will have to check Windows Update later today.
Further reading: Microsoft, Patch Tuesday, Windows XP
