A zero day threat, which was uncovered earlier this week impacts most versions of Internet Explorer, has already resulted in the German government advising users to stop using the browser. The good news, Microsoft is already working on a fix.
In the mean time, Microsoft has issued a temporary workaround for Internet Explorer until the company releases a full security update for its Web browser expected sometime today. The new “Fix it” solution helps protect users of Internet Explorer 6, 7, 8, and 9 from a recently disclosed memory corruption issue. The vulnerabilities could allow a hacker to gain remote access to your system with the same user privileges as you including the ability to install or remove programs, modify files, and create new user accounts.
The “Fix It” can be downloaded here.
IT security expert SophosLabs defines various threat levels from “Low” to “Critical”, based upon the prevalence of malware, spam and web threats, and intelligence regarding new vulnerabilities.
Judged on its own, SophosLabs rates the Internet Explorer vulnerability as critical – but the seriousness of the threat means that our experts rate the threat level on the net as a whole as “high”.
Until the vulnerability in Internet Explorer is fixed, users are recommended to use an alternative browser such as Mozilla Firefox or Opera Software.
