Computer Tips -Tech Info

We can expect 7 updates next week from Microsoft on the monthly patch day for July. Four of the updates will be for Windows, and 3 for Microsoft Office. There will be at least one critical update for each. It’s expected that we’ll see an update for the Excel issues that have been talked about […]

July 11th will mark the end of Microsoft’s support for Windows 98 and ME. Which means that there will be no further security updates for those systems after that date. In SOME ways, those systems may find comfort in the security through obscurity approach as much malware MAY not run on those systems, but that’s […]

Analyzing the state of the computer world…. Sophos Antivirus has suggested that consumers consider a Mac for their next PC if they’re concerned about the increasing swarm of malware targetting Windows PC’s. The main point being there are no ACTIVE malware threats against Mac systems and Windows still seems to be increasingly targetted. Mac will […]

I really like printers with their own built in print server. They can be plugged into the network and some operating systems can just find them. Unfortunately most of the time Windows doesn’t just find an IPP printer. One tool that can be handy for such a time as this is a free tool like […]

I hope there aren’t too many browser developers that have planned on taking July off….. I ran across browserfun.blogspot.com where it is planned to release information on a web browser vulnerability EACH DAY for the month of July. This comes to us from HD Moore of Metasploit. Judging from This securityfocus article, most of the […]

Version 2.0.3 of OpenOffice.org has been released. It includes quite a few bugfixes, including three security related fixes. The security vulnerabilities were apparently found in an internal audit. One of the improvements in 2.0.3 is an integrated update check, to be able to check for available updates directly from within OpenOffice. I think this is […]

Do you tire of XP’s blue screen text…. is it too drab and dry? Well you too can spice up your blue screen text…. This is not for the faint of heart when it comes to tinkering with “important files”…. But all you need is Windows XP and resourcehacker (Free). fluxiontech.com has the tutorial. Happy […]

For Windows system administrators that have sweated over the perils of usb drives and memory sticks…. Intelliadmin has a tool for you. It’s a small utility that will allow to remotely disable usb drives over the LAN. It won’t affect usb mice/keyboards – just usb storage. So, if your network security policy doesn’t like USB […]

There are a number of vulnerabilities that are currently unpatched, but have working publicly known exploits for Excel (*2) and Internet Explorer (2 vulnerabilities here as well.) Proof of Concept code has been released for both the Excel and Internet Explorer vulnerabilities. This means, with the code publicly available, it won’t be long before it’s […]

OK – there have been a number of Excel problems floating around in the last week – week and a half. Securiteam blog has a FAQ on the Excel 0-day vulnerabilities with Excel and Excel Viewer Incidents.org kindly gives us a scoresheet documenting the three different vulnerabilities that have been recently exploited. I have not […]