Microsoft PowerPoint flaw

A serious security hole affecting Microsoft PowerPoint is being attacked in the wild by a Trojan horse, Symantec Corp.'s DeepSight Threat Analysis Team warned late Wednesday. 

In an email analysis to customers, the Cupertino, Calif.-based antivirus giant said it is investigating to see if the exploit is tied to the previously known Microsoft Excel style handling and repair remote code execution flaw, with PowerPoint simply being used as a new attack vector. The company has advised IT administrators to make sure regular antivirus updates are applied as it carries out its investigation.

In its advisory, the DeepSight team said it has confirmed reports of an in-the-wild attack being performed with a maliciously crafted Microsoft Office PowerPoint file. "These attacks are exploiting a previously unknown and currently unpatched vulnerability affecting PowerPoint, and possibly Microsoft Office in general," Symantec said.The exploit arrives via email as a Microsoft PowerPoint document attachment, Symantec said. When a user launches the PowerPoint document, the vulnerability is triggered and attackers are then able to run malicious code

Posted in: Vulnerabilities