Morto Worm Takes Advantage of Remote Desktop Protocol

F-Secure warns in their blog about a network worm that takes advantage of Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) as a way to spread itself. Once this Morto worm has infected the system it starts scanning the local network for machines having Remote Desktop Connection enabled. This thing creates much traffic for RDP port, port number 3389/TCP.

More information about Morto in F-Secure blog and there is also a discussion going on at Microsoft's Technet forums.

PHP 5.3.7 Released

PHP development team has released 5.3.7 version of PHP scripting language. New version fixes big amount of bugs of which some are security related. All PHP users are recommended to upgrade their versions to this latest release.

More details about 5.3.7 release can be read from the official release announcement.

NSS Labs Browser Security Test Report

NSS Labs has published a report of a test they made to compare how different browsers managed against socially-engineered malware.

Tested browsers were:
-Apple Safari 5
-Google Chrome 12
-Windows Internet Explorer 9
-Mozilla Firefox 4
-Opera 11

Internet Explorer 9 became the winner. It was able to stop 96 percent of malicious links via its SmartScreen URL Reputation feature and in addition 3.2 percent when its Application Reputation feature was turned on. The second place was taken by Chrome 12 (13.2%). Apple Safari 5 and Firefox 4 shared third place with percent of 7.6. Opera 11 caught 6.1 percent of samples.

The full report (in PDF format) can be viewed here.

Security Updates From RealNetworks

RealNetworks have released updated versions of their RealPlayer. New versions contain fixes to several vulnerabilities.

Affected are:
- Windows RealPlayer earlier than 14.0.6
- RealPlayer Enterprise earlier than 2.1.6
- Mac RealPlayer earlier than 12.0.0.1701


Users of affected versions are advised to update their RealPlayer to the latest one available. More information can be read from related security advisory.

Mozilla Security Updates Available

Mozilla has released updates to Firefox and Seamonkey browsers and Thunderbird email client to address a bunch of vulnerabilities of which several categorized as critical.

Affected products are:
-Mozilla Thunderbird 2.x- and 3.x series
- Mozilla SeaMonkey 1.x- and 2.x series
- Mozilla Firefox 3.x- and 4.x series

Links to the security advisories with details about addressed security issues:
MFSA 2011-33 Security issues addressed in SeaMonkey 2.3
MFSA 2011-32 Thunderbird 3.1.12
MFSA 2011-31 Thunderbird 6
MFSA 2011-30 Firefox 3.6.20
MFSA 2011-29 Firefox 6

Fresh versions can be obtained via inbuilt updater or by downloading from the product site:
Firefox
Thunderbird
SeaMonkey

Security Updates From Adobe

Adobe has released updated versions of some of their software. Major part of fixed issues are categorized as critical. Many of the fixed vulnerabilities may allow an attacker to execute arbitrary code in target system.

Affected Adobe products are:
- Shockwave Player 11.6.0.626 and earlier (Windows & Macintosh)
- Flash Media Server 4.0.2 and earlier (Windows & Linux)
- Flash Media Server 3.5.6 and earlier (Windows & Linux)
- Adobe Flash Player 10.3.181.36 and earlier (Windows, Macintosh, Linux & Solaris)
- Adobe Flash Player 10.3.185.25 and earlier (Android)
- Adobe AIR 2.7 and earlier (Windows, Macintosh & Android)
- Adobe Photoshop CS5, CS5.1 and earlier (Windows & Macintosh)
- RoboHelp 9.0.1.232 and earlier (Windows)
- RoboHelp Server 9 (Windows)
- RoboHelp 8 (Windows)
- RoboHelp Server 8 (Windows)

More information behind the following links:
Shockwave Player
Flash Media Server
Flash Player and AIR
Photoshop
RoboHelp

ESET Global Threat Report for July 2011

ESET has released a report discussing global threats of July 2011.

TOP 10 threats list (previous ranking listed too):

1. INF/Autorun (1.)
2. Win32/Conficker (2.)
3. Win32/Sality (3.)
4. Win32/PSW.OnLineGames (4.)
5. HTML/Iframe.B.Gen (6.)
6. HTML/ScrInject.B (9.)
7. Win32/Dorkbot (11.)
8. Win32/Autoit (5.)
9. HTML/StartPage.NAE (8.)
10. VBS/StartPage.NDS (48.)


Complete report (with a description about each of the above listed threats) can be downloaded here (in PDF format).

Microsoft Security Updates For August 2011

Microsoft has released security updates for August 2011. This month update contains 13 security bulletins (two critical, nine important and two moderate).

A new version of Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool (MSRT) was released too.

More information can be read from the bulletin summary.

For consumer the easist way to get the update is to use Microsoft Update service.

New Chrome Version Available

Google has released a new version of their Chrome web browser. Version 13.0.782.107 contains fixes to 30 vulnerabilities of which 14 are high, nine medium and seven low categorized.

More information in Google Chrome Releases blog.

Symantec Intelligence Report: July 2011

Symantec has published their Intelligence report that sums up the latest threat trends for July 2011.

Report highlights:
- Spam – 77.8 percent in July (an increase of 4.9 percentage points since June 2011)
- Phishing – One in 319.3 emails identified as phishing (an increase of 0.01 percentage points since June 2011)
- Malware – One in 280.9 emails in July contained malware (an increase of 0.02 percentage points since June 2011)
- Malicious Web sites – 6,797 Web sites blocked per day (an increase of 25.5 percent since June 2011)
- 35.9 percent of all malicious domains blocked were new in July (an increase of 0.8 percentage points since June 2011)
- 21.1 percent of all Web-based malware blocked was new in July (an increase of 0.8 percentage points since June 2011)
- Aggressively unstable malware leads to a rise in sophisticated socially engineered attacks
- Phishers’ World in Your Cell Phone
- Large scale malware attack using URL shortening services
- Best Practices for Enterprises and Users


The report can be viewed here.